


Possession

by Dabberdees



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Completed, Emotional Hurt, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Heavy Angst, Horror, Intrusive Thoughts, Locked in a house, Mental Anguish, Mental Health Issues, Off screen torture I don't show it but it's mentioned, Possession, Psychological Horror, Summerween, all the hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-05-20 09:46:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 18
Words: 48,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19374199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dabberdees/pseuds/Dabberdees
Summary: A strange energy reading, one abandoned house and a mystery unsolved leads the Doctor and her Fam on a trip that none of them will forget anytime soon.With danger lurking from within their own circle, and the house actively working against them will the Doctor be able to figure out the mystery in time? And will she be able to do it without losing any of her friends in the process?COMPLETED.





	1. Chapter 1

“Bit creepy, innit,” Graham says deadpan while standing in a long-abandoned house. “Smells weird as well.”

Ryan closes his eyes and sighs. “And the award for the most obvious statement of the century goes to you grandad, congratulations.”

“Awards?” says the Doctor, her head poking up from the floorboards with cobwebs hanging from her hair. “I want an award.”

“This one, not so much, Doctor.”

“Look, son, I was just saying it’s creepy,” Graham points out again. “Seriously, Doc, why are we here?”

The Doctor pulls herself upwards, clapping her hands together to get rid of the dust on them. “The TARDIS picked up something here, thought we should check it out first, but I can’t seem to find anything with the sonic at the moment.”

“And that’s our job, why?” asks Ryan, resisting the urge to sneeze when the dust from the Doctor’s hands hits him.” Thought we were going someone else for this trip.”

“We were Ryan, but I picked up this signal.”

“So I ask again. Why?” 

“Because no one else would’ve picked it up like I did, possibly, not sure at the moment if I’m honest,” She looks back over to them. “Where is your sense of adventure guys? Strange house, weird energy signal and an alien world all mixed together.” She sees their less than happy faces. “Yaz would love this if she was here and not in the village.”

“We would’ve all been fine if you sent us to the village,” mumbles Graham as he walks forward and further into the house, trying to take the Doctor’s words to heart, and then pausing when it feels… wrong, somehow. He shakes his head. “Nah, I definitely left my sense of adventure back in the TARDIS and out of this creepy house, Doc,” Graham says, feeling even more put off when a chill hits him. “If I knew it was gonna be cold in here, I would’ve brought my jacket along.” He murmurs while rolling down his shirt sleeves, eyes looking down the corridor in front of him and catching something that he can’t quite make out. There’s an internal thought telling him to look away or tell the Doc, but there is something that makes it difficult to do so, so he stares at it instead, trying to make it out.

“It’s just a bit cold cause the house isn’t in the sun, Graham, once you’re back in it, you’ll be fine.” The Doctor reassures before turning to look out through the open door. “Yaz, she should’ve been back by now.”

Ryan smirks and gives a pointed look at his grandad who only nods his head back. “You told her to ask the people in the village what happened here; she’s probably gone all PC Khan on them, notebook and everything out.”

“Still, she should’ve been back by now,” The Doctor frowns. “Let’s head outside for a bit and wait for her to come back,” The Doctor suggests, already marching forward and past Ryan. “Come on my boys.”

“Oh, never call us your boys again, Doctor,” Ryan complains while following after her. He glances back over to his grandad. “You coming, or do you want to be the last person in the creepy house?”

“In a moment, son,” Graham replies, his gaze still looking down the corridor. He hears a distant call of Yaz’ name and feels relief that she’s back in sight again, or he hopes anyway. Yeah she’s a copper, but he doesn’t like having any of them out of his sight, call it a grandfather’s innate desire to protect. He looks back over to Ryan and smiles. “Go and see what Yaz has found out with the Doc, mate, I’ll be along in a second.”

“All right, suit yourself, stay in the creepy house all alone then,” said Ryan, playfully, before turning and exiting the house entirely.

“Oh, cheers for that!” Graham yells after him before turning back to the hallway again. He side eyes an ashtray type object on a nearby table and reaches a hand over to it slowly, picking it up. He returns his gaze onto the passage fully now, the weird thing he spotted still moving at the far end, and throws the ashtray down the corridor, jumping when it makes a racket across the floor. “Oh, bloody hell, Graham, scare yourself half to death for Christ sake, you bleeding idiot.”

When he catches his breath, he looks up again, breathing out a sigh when what he saw has stopped moving. “Just a figment then,” He steps back, eyes looking down the corridor again. “Still, proper creepy, though,” Graham mutters and goes to turn, stopping only when his eyes catch on the movement again… this time coming straight for him. “Oh, fuc-” and then he feels nothing but coldness and an out of body experience.

* * *

 

“You must know something about the abandoned house?” Yaz asks the ninth person she came across in the village. The previous eight refusing to say much of anything useful. “Anything?”

“I don’t, and neither does anyone else here, it’s been like that for years.”

“And you don’t want to find out, why?” She eyes the human in front of her. The Doctor mentioned something about this world being a colony in the future. “We’re just curious.”

The man stops, his eyes flicking in the direction of the house. “Look, love, stop while you’re ahead, cause those who ask about that place, either come back broken, changed… or they don’t come back at all.” And with that, he turns on his heel and stalks away from Yaz.

“You must know more, cause you’re the only one who’s told me that much, please.”

The man stops again. “Give it up, nothing good comes from it, go home and leave that place be, you’ll be better for it.”

She doesn’t stop him again, knowing that pushing him too much will not help her at all. “Creepy house is a go then, something definitely happened up there, great.”

Yaz turns away from the village and makes the trek back up to the house and through the creaky gates. “This house has everything, boarded up windows, creaky gate, dead plants.” She mutters to herself, the chill increasing as she steps further onto the property.

“Yaz!” The Doctor calls out to her, hand waving excitedly as she comes out from the house.

Yaz jogs over to her, now spotting Ryan exiting. “Hey, where’s Graham?”

Ryan gestures behind him with his thumb. “Still in there, said he’d be out in a moment.”

“In the creepy house by himself?” Yaz enquires in disbelief and with worry from the lack of people wanting to talk about the house still fresh in her mind. Then the warnings from the last man, yeah, she’s scared. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Why’s that, Yaz?” probes the Doctor, stepping towards her. “Did the villagers say anything?”

Yaz points back down towards the village. “Out of the people I spoke to only one said anything or even dared to talk about this house, something happened here that none of them wants to speak about. It’s creepy and weird, and my senses are telling us that we should leave it alone, Doctor. That we shouldn’t go poking the hornet’s nest when we don’t have to and all.”

“You scared like my grandad, Yaz?” Ryan teases.

Yaz levels a glare at Ryan. “And where is Graham, Ryan? Don’t you think it odd that a guy who turns away from Call The Midwife and those horror films we watched is now stood in the creepy house by himself without any sound coming from inside it?”

The Doctor glances back, finally noticing the silence. “Graham, you all right in there?” There’s no reply, and they all turn to look now. “Graham?” She asks again, walking forward.

“Gramps?”

There’s movement from inside, and they each take a cautious step back and then relax when Graham exits.

“What?” Graham said with a puzzled frown. “Why do you lot keep calling me?”

“Yaz was worried ’bout you,” Ryan reveals.

Graham turns to face Yaz. “Worried? Why?”

Yaz feels a right fool right now. “The folk in the village seemed terrified by this house, refusing to speak about it. Guess they got me worried as well.”

“Oh,” Graham nods, stepping forward and looking around the garden. “It’s a bit creepy, yeah, gotta agree with you on that, Yaz.” He bends and touches a dead plant. “Cause why is everything dead?”

The Doctor focuses on Yaz and sees the worry on her face. “You sure you’re okay, Yaz?”

Yaz watches as Ryan goes and kneels next to his grandad, both taking a closer look at the plants dotted around. “I feel like a fool, Doctor, got all scared and I wasn’t even in the house, even Graham seems fine, and he hates this stuff.”

“Nothing wrong with being scared, Yaz, keeps you on your feet.” The Doctor comforts before turning back to the boys. “Right you two, there doesn’t seem like there’s anything here after all, probably superstition, we can head back to the TARDIS and see about that planet with the two moons I told you about.”

“Actually, Doc, I wanna take a look in the house again cause I thought I saw something that looked interesting down the corridor,” Graham interjects as he stands, brushing his hands down his trousers. “That’s what took me so long.”

“What did you see?”

Graham shrugs. “I dunno, but you should come and have a look as well.” He makes his way to the door again, holding it open for them all to enter. “Seriously, it ain’t gonna take long, and then we can go to that planet you spoke about.”

Ryan looks between them all, quickly deciding to go along with what his grandad is suggesting. Graham gives him a smile when he passes him by. The Doctor follows after Ryan, her curiosity eating away at her as well.

Graham focuses on Yaz now. “Come on, love. It won’t take long.”

“Maybe I’ll just wait out here, Graham.”

Graham steps away from the door with a concerned expression on his face as he intently stares at her. “By yourself?”

The way he says it sends chills down her spine and the stare sets her on edge. “Are you all right, Graham?”

He steps back, smiling at her. “I’m fine, come on, we’re all going in now, and I’d hate to leave you out here by yourself, anything could be around.”

“Graham, don’t, I’m already freaked out.”

He smiles at her again. “Seriously, Yaz, it’s nothing, just a creepy house.” He clicks his fingers. “You know, like that one-” He frowns, eyes darting inside and then back to her. “-like the other side of Park Hill, those flats. The same thing really, ain’t it.”

Against her better judgement, she enters, spotting the Doctor and Ryan looking down the corridor as she rushes over to them.

Graham’s smile drops from his face as he enters, movement precise and like a predator stalking prey. He silently closes the door behind him and turns to stare at their backs. Head cocked to one side with a blank expression on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's summer and what's better than a Summerween fic.  
> Also, creepy house, while writing this I'm just picturing Waycrest Manor.


	2. Chapter 2

“Graham, what did you see down there?” The Doctor asks without looking over to him.

“There were lights or something, which was weird cause this place has no power, don’t it? Thought it a bit strange.” He answers her question and carries on watching them all, head still cocked at an angle. “Probably a kitchen or summit down there, ain’t there, might’ve been the light, and this _old fool_ here thought it was something weird.” He says with a smirk, face finally morphing into a vindictive expression.

_He watches as the three people that the body he’s currently using calls friends edge further down the corridor. He turns his head to the side, spotting his mental image of… this Graham, yes that’s his name, as he stares after his friends, terrified._

_“I’m going to kill them all.” He discloses to Graham, tone joyful. “Painfully or not, depends on my mood and how much trouble they cause me.”_

_Graham snaps his head to his own face, hating the expression on it. “Get out of my body.”_

_He looks to consider it for a moment before smiling at Graham and shaking his head. “No,” He starts to follow after the Doc, Ryan, and Yaz, with Graham keeping in step with him and looking pale. “You lot, or people like you, always come to this place to figure out what’s wrong. It’s predictable and oh so easy to drag people here. The villagers down there have the right idea, should’ve listened to them and the girls warning when she got back.” He side-eyes Graham. “Well, they would’ve if their caring friend didn’t drag them back in here.”_

_Graham goes to make a grab for himself, eyes going wide when his hand passes through. “What have you done to me?”_

_“Technically nothing, just using your body for the time being.” He says, looking down at it and then back to Graham. “You see when multiple people enter you always go for the one that looks the nicest or kindest, less suspicion and…  the look of betrayal when you kill them is oh so sweet. Your grandfather role fitted that today.” He leans in. “Nothing personal, really.”_

_Graham heads forward, intent on grabbing the Doctor and looking on in horror when his hands pass through her as well. “Doc!” He spins and faces himself again._

_“You can’t interfere, Graham,” He smirks back at him. “And they can’t see or hear me talking to you, oh, they’re none the wiser to the creature walking behind them.”_

“Graham was it to the left or right?” The Doctor asks, turning back and looking at Him.

“Left, that’s where I saw the lights, Doc.” He answers in a mimic of Graham’s voice. “Think it was a kitchen anyway, pretty derelict all things considered.”

_Graham stops his walking, and for the first time in his life, he feels genuine fear. He thought the uncertainty of cancer was scary, but this, this is something else entirely different, a whole other ball game. “Why are you doing this? What the hell do you gain from it?”_

_He shrugs at Graham and proceeds forward, hand rising and then resting on Ryan’s shoulder as he looks back with sinister eyes. “What about him first, isn’t he your grandson? Alternatively, what about the other one? The one that’s terrified of this place.” He looks over to the Doctor now. “Or that one, she’s not human, is she? That much I can sense within her or rip from your mind, you’re like an open book, Graham, did you know that?” He frowns and Graham feels like his mind is being dug through._

_“Get out of my head.”_

_He proceeds onwards, sifting through memories and then his eyes light up as he looks back at Graham. “Oh, who’s Grace?”_

_Graham clenches his hand at his side, refusing to answer the lunatic controlling his body._

_“Not going to answer? Pity, I was enjoying our conversation.” He looks ahead again. “Dead wife, interesting-”_

“Where was this light, gramps? Cause there’s nothing here now.” Ryan said perplexed. “If you’ve dragged us back here for no reason other than your old man eyes were playing tricks on you I’m gonna bring it up for weeks.”

“It was right here, I swear, cause that’s what took me so long to come back out because I came here.” He explains. “Honest, it wasn’t my eyes playing tricks on me. I generally saw something.”

Yaz feeling the chill raise next to her finally has enough and turns to exit. “There isn’t anything here, please, can we just go back to the TARDIS, Doctor?”

The Doctor looks around the room again, eventually pulling out her sonic and scanning. “If something were here the sonic would pick it up.”

_Graham looks over to himself and then back to the sonic in the Doc’s hand, hoping that’ll it pick up the creature inhabiting his body. “Oh, it’ll pick something up, but I’m not that careless to allow it to scan me, Graham. I know how it works from your memories, after all.”_

_“The Doc, she’ll stop you.”_

_He turns to Graham again, and Graham feels the same unpleasantness digging through his mind again. “No, she won’t, stopping involves killing, and according to you she doesn’t do that.” Graham sees his eyes narrow. “You are interesting… the places you’ve seen. It’s a pity I’m tied here now,” There’s anger in his voice as he speaks, and Graham hates the sound of it. He’s been angry, but that tone is rage incarnate. “The people who lived here, they brought it all on themselves with their carelessness, and cruelty, I only turn it back onto people who invade my home now.”_

_“She will stop you,” Graham says again. “I have faith that she will.”_

_“We’ll see, Graham, we’ll see.”_

_He follows after the trio in front as they make their way through the kitchen; his hand outstretched to the wall and a look of contentment on his face. “It feels good to be able to breathe again, to feel the air on my face and to touch the walls.”_

_“That’s not your face.”_

_“Isn’t it? I’ve had so many over the years, men, women, each one leaving a part of themselves behind.” He looks over to Graham. “Like you will, a little bit of your personality.” He presses a hand through Graham’s chest. “You’re a figment of my imagination, well, mentally and physically you’re still in here-” He points to Graham’s head. “-But I manifested you outside so we can talk face to face, I can do all sorts within this house.”_

_“Why don’t they see you speaking to me? Or moving around?” Graham demands, his eyes locked onto his friends and family._

_“Because to them I’m not moving, or talking-” Graham watches as his face frowns, and it’s so much like him that it hurts to see. “-This, what you see, is technically through my eyes, now because I am part of this house, that extends to you. You see what I see; I feel what you feel.”_

_“So we’re connected then?”_

_He shrugs. “In part, but you really have no power-” There’s a huge grin on his face. “I’m the driver, and you’re the bus to use an example that you’ll understand.”_

_“Who’s the passengers then?”_

_“They are,” He smiles and then turns back to the others, signalling that he’s done talking to Graham for the time being._

_Graham watches after them all, a sickening feeling rising as he watches himself smile and chat amongst them, the ability in which this creature blends in is horrifying. He stares at the Doctor, imploring her to figure it out, recognise that that isn't him._

The Doctor looks up, a minor frown on her face when she feels… _something_ very familiar touch the surface of her mine. Kind, almost, and completely alien to this house and place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Italics - Graham and 'Him'  
> Normal text - Him, the Doc, Ryan, and Yaz.


	3. Chapter 3

“Something was here, but it’s not now,” The Doctor explains with a scrunched face. “And there’s still that weird energy reading, come on Fam, we’ll pop back to the TARDIS and go over the data.” She stops again, tasting the air and frowning. Something is bugging her, she just can't put her tongue on it.

Yaz breathes out, feet itching to leave the kitchen and house. “Then we leave?”

“I’m not sure, Yaz, something is going on here, but I won’t know until I can run it through the TARDIS,” She takes her eyes away from the sonic. “We can leave when I’m certain nothing dangerous is here.”

“You were certain something wasn’t up earlier though,” Ryan reminds her.

The Doctor looks around the kitchen, hands on her hips. “Graham said he saw something… I don’t know what’s going on; the signal is here, and then it isn’t, it’s puzzling.” And annoying, the taste in the air still present.

“Is it ghosts, Doc?” He asks, playing the role of Graham quite well if he thinks so himself. “Please tell me ghosts don’t exist, Doc, I don’t need to worry about that as well.”

“Not ghosts, Graham,” The Doctor answers in a reassuring tone. “Though creatures can be mistaken for ghosts, unexplained sightings… usually, have a meaning behind them that’s not supernatural.”

“As long as you’re sure, Doc,”

The Doctor turns back to Graham again, reaching forward and taking his hand in hers. “There’s no such thing as ghosts, Graham.” Her face frowns, and she looks down at his hand. “You feel very cold.”

He gently pulls his hand away and frowns back at the Doctor. “I said it was cold earlier, knew I should’ve brought my jacket with me.”

“It is a bit chilly in here, Doctor,” Ryan adds on.

“Spose it is,” The Doctor murmurs before looking back up at her Fam again. “You humans do run at a higher temperature than I do.” She rambles off on her way back to the main doors.

_He flicks his eyes to Graham after watching the Doctor leave the kitchen. “You know, you worry enough about the cancer, that boy, his dad, and… pretty much everything really, it’s any wonder you aren’t dead now, you shouldn’t worry about ghosts on top as well after all the reality is often much worse.” He cocks his head to the side. “I could heal that cancer for you, by the way.”_

_Graham snaps his head to the creature in control. “What?”_

_“The cancer, could cure it, make it, so it never comes back. I have abilities that go beyond your basic medicines, and I would’ve used them on the villagers back in the day and the people who lived here in this house but-” He shakes his head, anger hitting his eyes again. “-Then they cut into my flesh, moulded me into jewellery and gifted me to a wife.”_

_“We didn’t do that, though,” Graham says, trying to appeal to him. “If you let me go, or even speak to the Doctor, she might be able to help repair-” Graham frowns. “-Whatever it is you are, you don’t have to harm them… please.”_

_“No,” He says. “I trusted people when they pulled me from the lake just after I crashed here… and then they tortured me.” He stares over to Graham, but his legs follow after the Doctor, Ryan, and Yaz, as they make their way to the front door. “I took the wife over as I took you over.” He smiles, reminiscing. “I had her kill her husband, kids, mother, her entire family and then when the authorities came. I had her kill herself.”_

_“You’re insane, a malfunction of some kind.”_

_“I might keep you alive, Graham, and then let you go when they’re all dead. I’ve done that throughout the years a few times, leave the captured one alive to live with what I made their body do.” He turns his attention back to Ryan. “Should I make him call me grandad as I kill him, Graham? Wouldn’t that be fun, a little family bonding experience? I could do it right now before either of the others have a chance to stop me.” He reaches a hand out, fingers clenching shut. “Just a squeeze and his neck is snapped, life gone from his eyes like… Grace, she died by falling, didn’t she? Perhaps I could push him from a window and watch.”_

_Graham’s face turns cold, losing all colour. “Please, don’t do this, I don’t care what you do to me but leave them alone, we’ve… they’ve done nothing to you.”_

_“You’re kind did this to me, Graham,” He yells. “-and I don’t particularly care about the semantics of who did it now, I just want you all to suffer like I did.”_

_“But we didn’t do that if you just… work with the Doc and us, then we could help you, free you from this place?” Graham walks closer, eyes darting to Ryan’s unaware ones, urging him to step away. “We can help, wouldn’t that be better?”_

_“And then what? She’ll let me go, free to do whatever, oh no Graham, not when I have a taste for killing and-” He stares back at the Doctor. “-She’d know all about that, I see it in her eyes and on the surface of her mind, she’s no stranger to killing.”_

_Graham turns his own head back to the Doctor. “What do you mean?”_

_“Those are eyes that have killed before Graham, perhaps if you went through with your own desires to murder you too would be able to see-”_

_“Stop it; you’re just tormenting me.”_

_He shrugs back at Graham, amused. “Am I though, or is it a truth you don’t want to see? Have you put her on a high pedestal, ignorant to what she is?”_

“Graham, did you shut the door?”

“What?” He asks, turning back and looking at Graham’s friends again.

“The door, did you shut it?” Yaz asks again.

He turns to look at the door, an innocent frown on Graham’s face. “No, I left it open.” He lies with a nervous sound to it. “Why would I shut the door to a creepy house, ain’t that rule number one in these situations? Don’t close off your only exit.”

“Well, it’s shut now.”

“Excellent observation, Ryan, if I’m the winner of the ‘most obvious statement of the century’ award then you’re runner up for it.” He says back with a playful smirk.

“All right, don’t throw my words back at me, gramps,” Ryan replies with a playful shove.

_“Stop it!” Graham yells with anger, sending a ripple of energy through the house that can be felt in a rumble. “Leave him alone.”_

_He notices this, eyes looking up and checking to see if Graham did which thankfully, he didn’t._

“Did anyone else feel that?” Yaz asks, worriedly. “Doc, can we leave, please, I don’t like this.”

“Actually, I’m with Yaz now,” Ryan admits. “Doors being shut by themselves, weird rumbles through the house.” Ryan leans away from his grandad. “And you know who always dies first in a horror film. It’s not the white people.”

“Ryan!” Yaz scolds. “I’m already scared, don’t add on to it.”

“I’m just saying.”

The Doctor walks to the door, hand reaching out and pulling on it. “Huh,”

“Huh?” Yaz says, walking closer. “What’s ‘huh’, Doctor?”

“The door is locked.”

“Locked? How is it locked?” Ryan says, walking forward as well and pulling on the door. “Maybe it’s just stuck.”

“Stuck by what, Ryan?” Yaz demands, breathing hard.

The Doctor pulls out her sonic again and aims it down at the lock, groaning when nothing happens. “Weird, it’s not actually locked, and my sonic doesn’t do wood.”

“It doesn’t do wood, Doc?” He says in a deadpan voice. “Why doesn’t it do wood?”

“It’s on my to do list, Graham, right after getting us out of here.” The Doctor retorts. She aims the sonic back down again, this time scanning and looking at the data she receives. “The same energy is running across this door.”

“The same energy?” Yaz enquiries. “Like in the kitchen?”

“Like in the entire house, Yaz.” The Doctor says as she looks away from the door, this time raising the sonic high and scanning. “Come on, Fam; we’re having a wander around the house, maybe find an unboarded window or something.”

“Should we split up?” He suggests causing all three of them to turn round and stare at him, incredulous. “All right, no splitting up then.”

_“They’re not idiots,” Graham said._

_“No, they aren’t, but you wouldn’t believe some of the people who did come here, people on dares or people trying to speak to the spirit of the woman who killed her family, never me always her. Spos_ _e she's remembered for murdering her family, that's a great honour.” He moans before looking back over to the trio. “Not you lot though, intelligent, faithful and a family. The best combination.” He grins wildly. “To rip apart.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Graham day gets worse.  
> Oh, don't worry, the Doc, Ryan, and Yaz they have it coming as well.


	4. Chapter 4

_Graham has figured out that as much as he wants to walk away, he can’t. He’s restricted to being in the general vicinity of the madman in control of his body. Not that he would walk away, mind, being a spectre and all, also that would mean leaving his friends and family behind, and that’s not acceptable._

_So he stares at the creature quietly talking to Yaz, a knot of fear sitting within him. The poor girl is freaked out, they all are, even the Doc, but she’s better at hiding it, and here he is talking to Yaz, telling her that it’s going to be alright when he’s actually planning on killing her and the others._

“Any luck on your side?” The Doctor asked, her head angled over her shoulder to see how Graham and Yaz are getting on by their windows.

“No luck, Doctor, it’s not budging.” Yaz answers. “There isn’t a locking mechanism, like the rest of them, it’s just stuck.”

“What about your window, Graham?”

_“No point in asking him, Doc, he’s actively working against you.” Graham snarks from the corner he’s stood in with his arms crossed._

_“Helpful Graham, it’s a real shame she can’t hear you.”_

“Not moving as well, Doc.” He says at the same time.

The Doctor gives a nods at Ryan, both now stopping with theirs. “Group up, we’ll have to try something else.”

They all walk into the centre of the dining room, Ryan and Yaz on one side and the Doctor and what they think is Graham on the other.

_“You coming over as well, Graham?” He smiles over to him. “It’s a group up after all, and you look like such a spoil-sport standing in the corner with your arms crossed by yourself, join the Fam.”_

_“You ain’t a part of us,” Graham says with a scowl before walking over, body tensed and hands clenched onto himself for comfort. He goes and stands next to the Doctor, eyes locked on her face and wishing she could just see him._

_“That’s the spirit,” He smirks at Graham. “Get it, on account of you being all ‘ghost-like’ and all.”_

_Graham snaps his eyes from the Doctor and leans across the table, not noticing his hand passed through hers at first. “Oh, and who made me like this?” He stares ahead, finally noticing where his hand has landed. He flicks his eyes to the Doctor’s face, catching her looking down at it in puzzlement._

_He grins broadly back at Graham, missing the connection that Graham and the Doctor are making and then turns his attention away as Graham carries on glaring angrily at him, his hand still placed where the Doctor’s is. Hoping that she can feel something._  


The Doctor stares at her hand, the coldness pressed against it unpleasant and at first, she wants to pull her hand away, chalk it up to the house, but she doesn’t when she feels anger and… fear, mainly fear, but it’s something so familiar. Anger tinged with fear and like what she felt earlier…

“Doctor?” She hears Ryan ask. “You alright? You look a little bit spaced out.”

The Doctor pulls her hand away, the coldness instantly gone and looks up at the young lad. “I’m fine, Ryan, was just thinking about something.” She tastes the air again, the flavour still there. Like… water frozen on a rock overnight. Cool and numbing.

“Oh, right,” Ryan says, drawing her attention back to the conversation.

“We’ll take a minute to recoup, try and think of something, right Fam?” The Doctor orders, looking at each of them individually to check how they’re doing. Ryan looks reasonably okay, slight worry in his eyes but overall, okay. Yaz looks pale, her hand clinging onto her arm and that breaks the Doctor’s hearts to see her usually reliable friend looking so scared.

“Yaz, you okay?”

Yaz looks up and smiles weakly back at the Doctor. “I’d be lying if I said I was okay, Doctor, they don’t exactly teach haunted houses in the police force, and watching films is one thing, being apart of one is another.”

“I’ll get us out of here, think of something, always do. Just take a moment off for the time being.” The Doctor responds voice kind and reassuring.

“Come on, Yaz, we’ll have a look for some clues, like proper police work, I’ll be your deputy,” Ryan suggests walking away and heading over to a cabinet filled with broken plates. He catches the Doctor’s eye and gives her a slight nod, which the Doctor returns, grateful that he’s distracting Yaz for the time being.

She turns her attention to the last person of her Fam, stood to her left and staring at her. “Doc?”

“Oh, Graham,” The Doctor says, reaching out a hand to him and placing it against the top of his. Her brow creased in thought. “You still feel cold.”

He goes to pull his hand away again, stopping when the Doctor holds onto it tighter. “Doc, I’m just cold that’s all, you can give my hand back now.”

The Doctor stares back, brow furrowing deeper. “You were complaining about the cold earlier, Graham, are you alright?”

_Graham leans forward, his palms pressed down on the table as he stares at the Doctor’s left hand. He flicks his eyes up to the creature, both locking briefly before reaching forward-_

_“Don’t you dare-”_

_-And placing his hand in the Doctor’s left again, watching as her face turns to her other hand in confusion. “Didn’t account that maybe she’d be able to feel me? I might be a manifestation within your head but I’m still in that head of yours, of mine I mean, connected to this house. I figured it out when you were goading me about being a spirit, too caught up in-” Graham cuts himself off, now pulling his hand away and gripping onto his ribcage in pain. “What… ah, what are you doing?” He grunts out, breath coming in gasps from the sharp pain._

_“Do something like that again, and I will snap another rib.”_

_Graham stumbles back, hand still pressed to his side. “Don’t you hinder yourself, doing that?” He breathes out, the urge to throw up strong. “Seems counter-” He sucks in a breath, not physically but the motion is there all the same and stares back up at himself. “-productive.”_

_He shrugs at him, healing the broken bone. “When you can heal wounds, it really doesn’t matter what you cause. I can keep repeatedly breaking ribs and healing them until you get the message.”_

“Graham?” The Doctor says, eyes looking at her left hand as she raises it and then going to her right. Whatever that was that touched her twice, it felt the same as what she’s currently feeling in her right hand. “Are you alright?”

Graham looks at her, eyes unfocused and grey. “I’m fine,” He snaps, now pulling his hand away. “Just this house is… unsettling and it’s my fault we’re stuck in here now.”

The Doctor glances at Ryan and Yaz, content that they’re far enough away. She needs to touch Graham again, just something minor so she can feel the surface of his mind, make sure that he’s alright. “It’s not your fault, Graham.”

“It is my fault, Doc, cause I had us all come back here to check on something that wasn’t even there.”

_“She’s suspicious of you.” Graham says, hand still holding onto his chest. “She’s got you now, you bastard.”_

He doesn’t respond to the man, stood behind her and holding his side still. “Honestly, Doc, I’m just worried.”

“How is your blood sugar?”

“My what?”

“Blood Sugar, you don’t have your jacket on you,” The Doctor points out. “You just have your shirt and that has no pockets.” Her face turns concerned. “We were only meant to be here for less than an hour, but we’ve been here a few now.”

He looks puzzled, he knows he does, and that’s not going to do at all. Damn the man for distracting him, if he had the time, he would’ve sorted through his memories with care, looking at them all and building a cover, but he doesn’t have the time. So, instead of doing that, he’s tearing through them quickly, trying to find the answer to that question. He sees Graham holding onto his head, and he hardly cares to make a comment about the pain he’s causing right now.

“Oh! My jacket, that jacket.”

“You usually carry something on you to eat, Graham, you keep all sorts in there. Sometimes I wonder if the TARDIS made it bigger on the inside for you.” The Doctor says, walking forward and watching his face. “But there’s nothing to eat here, did you eat before leaving the TARDIS? I’m concerned about your well being.”

Did he? Graham’s mind is a mess of stuff right now, sifting through that will take time. “I had my usual, Doc, you know, but I’m fine, truly. Worry ‘bout the others.”

The Doctor closes the gap again, her hand reaching out and retaking his. If he pulls away, she’ll know something is up, so he doesn’t. Letting her take his hand, and he can- Oh, that’s not _good_ … He mentally flicks his eyes to Graham.

_“She's a damn telepath?!” He snaps out, realising instantly the danger he’s now in as she holds onto his hand. “How did you keep that from me?” Graham, for his part, tries to hide his own shock at that new piece of information. “Oh, wait, you didn’t know, did you?”_

_“Seems that worked out in my favour then, cause she doesn’t tell us everything and we don’t ask her to speak about her past when she doesn't want to.”_

_“Then you’re all fools,” He yells back, hastily building walls to hide and protect himself, pushing parts of Graham forward. Just the pieces that she’ll assume is him anyway. If he were sure he could without risking himself, he would dig into her brain… and try to find out more about her but he can’t, not at the moment. To great of a risk, so he’s just got to rely on whatever Graham knows about her. Which isn’t much, all things considered. "You allow her to take you to places... in that ship, and you don't know a thing about her? I guessed earlier, saw what she was hiding behind her eyes, it makes sense she never told you anything if what I thought was true."_

_"The Doc, she has her secrets-"_

_"She has a lot more than secrets, Graham." He interjects while finishing the walls. "A lot more."_

“Well, tell me if you think your blood sugar is low, Graham, I might have a few jelly babies on me somewhere.” The Doctor smiles at him, hand touching Graham’s and her mind brushing through the surface of his mind, not intrusive, she wouldn’t do that without his permission but just enough to… _huh_ , she thinks, half expecting to find his emotions conflicted and fear not a blankness tinged with fear. Something or someone has thrown up a wall and a quick one at that to stop her from searching. It’s possible Graham could do that, unintentional perhaps, but… unlikely, very unlikely.  They stare at one another before she releases his hand, watching as he steps back.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Doc, but I’m good at the moment.” He says, anger coming forward now. “Just, focus on getting us out of here, cause I don’t wanna be here any longer than I have to.” He turns and walks away, heading over to a window to look out through the holes in the boards. His hands clenching on the wood.

_“If you say something now, I’ll snap another rib, and this time I won’t heal it, I’ll just apply pressure until it suits me to fix it.”_

_Graham is wise enough to know when to shut up and when to goad, and this time isn’t the time to do that. Instead, he looks to the Doc again, watching her face as she stares at his back._

“Keep me posted, Graham,” She says, loud enough for Ryan and Yaz to pick up on. “About your blood sugar, alright.” Ryan glances over to Graham and then back to the Doctor, who waves his concern away for the moment.

Something is definitely wrong with Graham, but what? She doesn’t know at the moment, but whatever it is, she can’t trust him for the time being, and that means, they really aren’t going to split up like he suggested before. She’ll keep him where she can see him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is suspicious.  
> Ryan and Yaz will have a bigger part to play towards the second half, but we're getting there.  
> Graham is still having a bad day.  
> The creature got scared when it realised it wasn't just dealing with someone that wasn't human.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "throws confetti* Yaz finally has something to do!
> 
> We got there in the end.

The Doctor removes her gaze from Graham and claps her hands together, bringing everyone’s attention back to her. “Break time is over, Fam.”

“Break time?” Ryan says with a smirk, his arm nudging Yaz. “Didn’t realise she paid us?”

Yaz looks up and smiles back, feeling slightly better. “It’s work experience, Ryan.”

“Oh, like when the Job Centre sends you on a course? Saying that you’ll get a job at the end, and then you don’t, and they put you on another course, repeating the process?”

Yaz raises an eyebrow at him. “That sounds personal, Ryan.”

He snorts and smiles. “Seriously, just ask Graham,” He looks up to Graham’s back. “Ain’t that right, grandad?”

The Doctor watches as Graham turns around again, eyes focused on Ryan. “Yeah, they do, don’t they?” His tone is clipped, tense and distracted.

But he seems relatively normal now she thinks, but there’s an unease growing within her. “Back on topic, Fam.” She looks to Ryan and Yaz. “Khan and Sinclair, on the case, what did you two find?”

“Apart from a bunch of broken plates, Doctor? Not much, really.” Ryan explains.

“There were a few scraps of paper, but most of it has decayed over the possible years that this place has been abandoned,” Yaz informs, coming forward with the few scraps that could have anything useful on them. “Most of this just says dates, or what happened in the news I think.”

The Doctor accepts the scraps from Yaz, her eyes noting everything on them and then discounting it. “Not ideal, perhaps there’s more in other rooms, like bedrooms or a study if this house has anything like that.”

“It should considering its size, Doctor, looked like a manor from outside and it’s sat overlooking the village.” Yaz brings a hand up to her face, thinking the problem over. “If we use manor houses from England, they’re usually sat away from the village. Like up a hill and they tend to have a fence around them like this place has.”

The Doctor beams at her. “Yasmin Khan, do I ever tell you how brilliant you are?” Yaz reddens at the praise. “Cause you are, truly.”

“Just doing my job, Doctor,” Yaz says, looking embarrassed as Ryan wiggles his eyebrows at her. She gives him a light shove. “Shut up, Ryan.”

He gives her another smirk before turning back to the Doctor. “So, I know it seemed like a daft idea before, but should we split up? You and Yaz, me and my gramps?” Ryan wonders.

“No,” The Doctor says all too quickly, causing Ryan and Yaz to frown at her and Graham to… do not much of anything, really. “No, I’d rather keep you all in my line of sight.” She finishes, the comment being aimed at Graham more than the others.

“Why, Doctor?” Graham asks, face neutral. “You really think something in here is going to kill us all?” Ryan and Yaz turn to him, wide-eyed. “Come off it, you two, it’s obvious that people have died here, why else would this place look like a shithole?”

“Graham?” Yaz says, concerned at the swearing.

“What?” He stares at her, hands wrapped himself. “You yourself heard the villagers, those who come here-

“Graham, stop it, we don’t need that at the moment.” The Doctor commands, staring straight at him.

_“What are you doing?” Graham asks, looking directly at him while walking around the table._

_“Feigning fear, also this-”_

“And why not?” He says, staring at them all. “This is just like you to drag us into a half baked situation cause you picked up something on your ship.” He snaps at the Doctor. “Like that planet with that blue bastard, couldn’t keep away from it, could you? Dragged us into that and then you had a go at me.”

_"No, not that... stop it."_

_He looks at Graham, eyes dark and hateful. “Should I tell them what she told you? ‘If you kill him, you’ll be just like him.’ was the gist of it, wasn’t it? Or should I tell Ryan how close you came to doing it… the urge to kill, so strong.” He closes his eyes. “Powerful, wasn’t it? And exhilarating, you should've done it, Graham."_

_“Stop it, please.”_

_“You even felt pleasure shooting him… oh don’t deny it, Graham, and then the icing on the cake, you locked him away for eternity with no hope for rescue.” He opens his eyes again. “Some would say that’s crueller, and yet she praised you for it… called you the better man.”_

_“Don’t, please… don’t tell them-”_

“You were gonna kick me off the team if I killed him, we never did tell them that, did we Doctor? How you told me to be the better man, and then you went and flung that Dalek into space like you had the right.”

_"You really should learn to close you mind Graham, anyone could delve into it."_

_Graham closes his eyes, his walking stopped as he leans down on the table feeling sick and ashamed._

_“You feel ashamed because you wonder if that’s truly what you think or whether it’s something I cooked up to hurt you and them.”_

_Graham can’t reply, he can’t do this… can’t deal with that creature knowing every thought he’s ever had, however fleeting._

The Doctor leans dangerously down on the table as well, almost mirroring the action that Graham did, only her face is filled with an intimidating expression. “Graham, I don’t know what has gotten into you but that-”

“Was different?” He throws back at her and watches as she looks away. “Cause it seems the same to me, only you got to take revenge.”

“Grandad, what the hell was that for?” Ryan glares at Graham. “And anyway, wasn’t it you who wanted to come back into the house? You dragged us all back in here to have a look at something that wasn’t even there in the first place.”

He turns to Ryan again, feet taking a step towards him. “Oh, so this is my fault now?”

The air turns cold, around them as the Doctor stares between the two men, wondering if this sudden change in atmosphere is the houses doing, maybe that’s what affecting Graham, but if it is then why isn’t it affecting her or the others as much? “Step away from each other now.”

“Gladly,” Ryan says back. “Cause he’s being a royal twat, just cause you’re scared don’t mean you can take it out on the Doctor when it was your brilliant idea to bring us back inside.”

Yaz walks between, hands spread and eyes darting to both of their faces when she sees Graham about to retort. “It’s no one’s fault,” She says, police tone overriding her fear. “The Doctor didn’t know what happened in this house, hell we still don’t-

_“That bastard murdered everyone,” Graham mumbles to himself, informing Yaz uselessly. “And he’s destroying what we built together, knowing exactly what to hit.”_

“-But that doesn’t mean we should turn on each other, for all we know it could be the house doing it. Winding us up and trying to make us walk in different directions, trying to separate us.”

_“Oh, she is good for a human, Graham. Usually, it takes them longer to figure it out.” He cocks his head to the side. “I can see why you’d keep her around, she’s also quite-”_

_“Don’t you dare.” Graham finally says. “Don’t you fucking dare.”_

_He smirks back at Graham before shrugging. “I don’t care for that, luckily for you, got better things to do with my time.”_

The Doctor looks over to Yaz with pride blooming in her chest. She’s still scared, but she’s putting it behind her, moving on to the bigger problem at hand. And that’s not Ryan as she turns and faces it head-on. “Graham,”

“What?” He snaps at her, still playing with them all. Like a cat with a mouse that stumbled into its home.

“Did anything… happen to you, when you were in the house by yourself?” He shrugs at her and turns away. “Graham, answer the question.”

“I don’t know,” He starts to say, running a hand across his eyes and really milking it for all it’s worth. “I thought I saw something, I still do, maybe, I don’t know-” He turns around, eyes imploring each of them to believe him. “-Something was down that hallway, honest… and I think it’s just stressed me out, or got to me, I don’t _know_.” He now looks to the floor.

The Doctor doesn’t know what to think now, perhaps he’s just scared and lashing out, or perhaps something did affect him while they were all outside and that’s what she felt. She goes forward, but he steps away from her, pacing across the worn carpet and away from her touch.

“Do you think that’s possible, Doctor?” Yaz asks. “That something got to Graham.”

“Nothing got to me, Yaz.” He said. “I’m still me, ain’t I?” _He flashes a wink at  Graham._

“I don’t know, Yaz.” The Doctor says, truthfully. “I really don’t.”

He pulls out a chair and takes a seat, arms folded across his chest as he looks up to Ryan. “Sorry mate, for being a _‘royal twat’._ ”

Ryan looks over to him, the annoyance on his face fading slightly. “Yeah, you were… and I’m still annoyed but if something is affecting your emotions or whatever, then perhaps it’s understandable.”

_“Thanks, Ryan,” Graham says with pride that he’s willing to forgive him, even if it wasn’t him being a prat technically. He turns and then levels a glare at his doppelganger. “Why’d you do that for? What was the use in bringing that all up?”_

_“Wanted to see how quickly I could make you lot argue, didn’t count on the girl diffusing the tension so quickly.”_

“But you’re my grandad, and family can be arses to each other sometimes,” Ryan says, walking closer and patting him on the shoulder awkwardly. “Just don’t make a habit of it, I get that sometimes you lose patience or you’re scared, but we’re here for each other, right? Doing it for my nan and all.”

_“Aw, how sentimental.” He taunts._

Graham has a look of hurt across his face, as the creature looks up at Ryan before standing and pulling him into a hug. “Yeah, we got each other haven’t we.” The creature aims itself so Graham can look into its face, the malicious stare levelled at him, making him feel sick.

_“Just a little squeeze right now, and his ribs will snap like yours did. That’s all it takes to kill a human.”_

Ryan flicks his eyes between Yaz, who’s smirking at him, and the Doctor who looks frustrated by something. “Alright, gramps, you can let me go now.” He says, patting what he thinks is Graham on the back. “Seriously, Yaz is here, come on-”

The creature releases Ryan and steps back before turning to look at Yaz. “I can give Yaz a grandfather hug as well,”

_“Don’t touch them, please,” Graham says, voice low and pained. “Please, they’re just kids, let them all go- and you can have me. You said you liked the feeling of being able to smell and touch again, so why not just let them all go and keep me?” He tries to bargain._

_“Or, kill them all and keep you under my control.” He frowns at Graham. “That’s not a smart bargain to make to me, half the time I killed the person I took because they annoyed me, and yeah, you have, but there’s something else about you.” Graham feels the rummaging through his mind again. “The things you’ve seen, they would keep me entertained for a while, allow me to see more than just this house on a hill. Let me see my home again.” He trails off, face thinking about something._

_“Your home?”_

_He locks his eyes back onto Graham’s again, deciding not to answer that at all. “I could hold onto you until the next lot come in.” He cocks his head to the side, considering the idea. “We could be a team, like-” He smirks, clearly enjoying this. “-a Fam, killing everyone who comes here.”_

_“You’re psychotic.”_

_“And you might come to be like me when you’re subjugated to torture.”_

_Graham furrows his brows. “You said they carved into your flesh-” He’s not sure why he’s asking this, he supposes he’s trying to understand what would cause someone to become like this. “-when you crashed here. What did you mean?”_

_He looks back over to Graham. “They carved into my body to get to my heart.”_

_And that wins the award for ‘most vague-ish answer ever given’ Graham thinks. “Were you a ship, or something? Living, like the Doc’s or?”_

He turns away from Graham now, not wanting to answer that question as well and focuses back onto the three others in the room. “So what are we going to do, then? Can’t just stay in this room, can we?”

The Doctor looks to Yaz. “What do you think we should do Yaz?”

“Me?” Yaz says, suddenly and feeling put on the spot.

“Yup, what do you think we should do?” The Doctor asks with confidence.

She thinks about the problem at hand for a moment before looking up at the Doctor. “Well, we should find out what happened here.” Yaz starts, brows furrowing as her police training takes over. “It could explain what’s keeping us locked within the house.”

“And where could we do that?”

“A study or something, it might have notes on what happened, or a diary.”

The Doctor nods. “We’ll find a study or living room first then.”

She makes her way to the dining rooms door, eyes darting back to each member of her Fam. “You go first, Graham.”

“Why?”

 _Because I want to keep an eye on you._ Is what she wants to say, instead, settling for “You have a better sense for direction.” Which is a feeble excuse in her honest opinion, but she breathes out when Graham shrugs and walks towards the door. “You two next, I’ll be at the back.”

Ryan and Yaz nod and both step out and into the hall with the Doctor following behind, her keen eyes fixated on Graham’s back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter we learn what the 'thing' is and I'll give you a clue, it's a race of creatures that exists in the Doctor Who universe but never once appeared on the actual show.


	6. Chapter 6

“You sure you don’t want to walk in the front, Doc?” He stops to ask. “Cause this house is huge, and we’ve been wandering around for ages now.”

“I’m good at the back, Graham.” The Doctor answers. _I’ll rather keep you where I can see you_ , she thinks, however.

_“You know where the study exactly is, don’t you?” Graham questions and he knows he’s right when the creature doesn’t answer. “There’s something in there that you don’t exactly want them seeing, isn’t there?”_

_He indeed does, and now Graham knows it as well because of his refusal to answer. He can feel her staring at his back, his own telepathy defending himself from her probing gaze. She knows or at least suspects something now._

_“She’s clever; I’ll give her that, Graham, perhaps too clever for her own good.”_

_He clenches a hand at his stupidity though. The Doctor, he never counted on her being a telepath, he knew she wasn’t human, which means he should’ve probed further before taking action… made a cover story but in his arrogance and exuberance, he’s tackled a party of four that are unique and actually suited for the likes of him, and that makes them dangerous. Even the older man he’s taken over, although trapped and at his mercy, he’s troublesome or better put, stubborn. If he figures out he has more power than he was lead to believe.... then, well, he doesn’t know._

_Coupled with the aid of the Doctor... he’s in danger. Years built making this house a trap for the arrogant youth, and the foolish elders could be undone in a matter of hours… and he considers turning, attacking them now but that’s reckless._

_And he’s had enough of being reckless, he needs to think and plan, and that involves losing the Doctor and her human friends, which means revealing himself to her. Neither one is good, but she suspects and he’ll rather know where he stands with her, better to plan that way._

“Well, what if you lot go and look for it cause I’m tired.” He says, leaning against the wall. “You told me to tell you when my blood sugar was low, and I think it is now.”

_Graham frowns… he’s worked out that he still feels whatever the creature feels and he knows his body well enough to know when his blood sugar is low. This isn’t that, and might never be considering he hasn’t felt hungry in a while like he usually would by now. “What are you doing?”_

_He ignores Graham._

“I think it might explain why I was the way I was back in the dining room,” He closes his eyes and starts to lower himself to the floor. “Seriously, I’ll be fine here if you lot want to head off.” The Doctor frowns slightly at him; her head cocked at an angle.

Ryan walks forward and squats down next to him. “You don’t have anything on you?”

He shakes his head and pulls at his shirt. “No jacket, no snacks… we were only meant to be here for an hour at max, and it was a sunny day back in-” He flicks his eyes up at Graham, pulling the information from his head again. “-Sheffield, didn’t think I would need it.”

Ryan makes a show of looking through his own clothes, hoping to find anything and only pulling out a packet of chewing gum. “These ain’t gonna be any good for you.”

“Thought that counts though, innit son?”

Yaz comes round to his side as well and rests a hand on his shoulder, her face turning worried. “You’re freezing cold, Graham, why haven’t you said anything?”

Ryan looks up at Yaz’ hand, his own resting on Graham’s jeans. He moves his hand to Graham’s and feels the same as he clasps it. “Do you want my jacket? Cause I’ll be fine for a while without it, gramps.”

He shakes his head and settles himself on the floor. No intention of moving, he needs time away from the trio… because he knows the game is nearly up, and he wants to make sure his _heart_ is secure before they figure it out.

“Honestly, I think if I just rest for a bit and catch back up with you three, I’ll be fine.”

The Doctor watches him closely, her suspicion rising as they lock eyes. She knows something is wrong with him, and she’s beginning to think he’s caught onto that as well. This isn’t… or part of it anyway, isn’t the Graham she knows. “I think he’s right, team.”

“You do?” Ryan exclaims in shock. “You said we shouldn’t split up.”

“Have to agree with Ryan here, Doctor, if Graham’s blood sugar is low then one of us should stay with him in case he passes out.”

“Oh, no, you don’t have to do that cause I’ll only slow you three down, wouldn’t I?” He says, looking back at the Doctor. “Seriously. I’ll be fine after a rest and nothing has harmed us yet, has it?”

_“You’re planning something, and you need them to be gone, lest you tip them off.” Graham realises._

_“Graham, I’m busy at the moment, so for once, shut up.”_

_Graham scowls at him. “No, I don’t think I-” He cuts himself off as a wave of pain shoots through his body, severe and sharp and bringing him to his knees, making him unable to call out through the spikes of agony._

_“Have you got the message?” Graham nods, the pain lessening to a dull ache. “Good, but I’m not stopping the pressure anytime soon, I need you to learn.”_

The Doctor walks forward, gently making her way past Ryan. “You two, go and have a look in the room over there, see if you can spot anything of use.”

“You sure, Doctor?” Yaz probes.

She smiles at Yaz. “Of course, nothing can go wrong with Khan and Sinclair on the case, can it? You two work well together.”

Ryan squeezes Graham’s hand, standing and gesturing for Yaz to go first when she lingers. “We’ll be in the room over, Yaz, the Doctor, will hear if anything happens.”

Yaz hangs back for a moment longer before walking past the Doctor and patting the alien woman on the shoulder. “Anything happens to you two as well, just call out, and we’ll come back.”

“We’ll be fine Yaz, won’t we, Doc?” He says, staring at the Doctor.

The Doctor nods, her gaze locked on his. “Yeah, right as rain, _Graham_.”

_Graham watches this exchange through pained eyes; the creature has lowered the pain it’s causing but not stopped it completely. If he only knew how it was doing it, maybe he could figure out a way to stop it. Then again, he’s been pretty powerless as of yet, the only thing he’s managed to do is touch the Doctor, and even then, that wasn’t much._

The Doctor waits until Yaz and Ryan have entered the room before turning her head and staring at the person in front of her, expression neutral and unyielding to what she’s feeling underneath. “ _Graham_.”

He levels an equally blank expression back up at her. “ _Doctor_.” Time to use her full title, not the nickname Graham gave her, give her the respect as an opponent and all... or something like that anyway. “What seems to be the problem?”

The Doctor leans in close, breath touching and she can feel the unnatural coldness from Graham. “I don’t know, _Graham_ , why don’t you tell me?” She places a hand against his hand, her mind probing and finding the hastily constructed wall again. “Didn’t know you knew how to build mental defensives, _Graham_ , you kept that quiet.” The pronunciation of Graham’s name, drawn out and on purpose, and not lost at all on the pair of them.

He smiles back, turning his hand in hers and holding onto it as an old friend would. “I’m full of secrets, Doctor, would you like to see one?”

The Doctor feels the wall being lowered ever so slightly and the urge to pull back when she feels the rage and hate bleeding through, but she holds on, digging further and- “ _Graham_.” She says, this time with affection when she looks forward and past the man presently watching her. She sees the pain on his face and figures it out. The hand she’s holding, although Graham’s technically, isn’t his because he’s currently not in control of it, and it breaks her hearts that she can’t physically help him yet.

_Graham sucks in a breath as the Doctor stares directly at him, this time actually seeing him he realises. “Doc, you can see me?”_

She turns to the creature watching her. “Let him go.”

He shakes his head. “No, I need his body for what I have planned.”

“I could stop you right now, rip into your head and destroy you.”

The creature purses his lips at her, knowing full well she could do that. “But, Doctor-” He leans in further, hand holding onto hers tightly. “Would you be able to do it before I destroy his mind as well? Because if you’re going to destroy mine, the least I could do would be to return the favour to him.”

“Stalemate, then,” She looks back to Graham again and sees the agony and fear in his eyes. “I’ll fix this Graham, you won’t-” He fades from her mind, the wall being built again and hiding his presence from her.

_“You bastard,” Graham says, struggling forward and reaching for the Doc’s hand, only to find the pain build up again._

_“Graham, behave, the adults are talking now.”_

He lets go of her hand now. “I suggest you go and find the two kids, who knows what they could be getting up to in a house that wants to kill them.”

The Doctor stands, her face dangerous with eyes flicking towards the room Ryan and Yaz entered. “I’ll defeat you as soon as I find out what you are.”

The creature shrugs his shoulders at her. “People have tried before, Doctor, and they’ve all failed, how are you convinced that you can stop me now?”

“You haven’t dealt with someone like me before.” She warns as she leans in closer, but remains standing. “And you have one of my friends held hostage against his will which is never a clever thing to do to me.”

_No, he hasn’t faced someone like her before, that’s true, and he’s not stupid enough to reveal and confirm it for her as he flicks his eyes to Graham’s, his flesh paled from the constant pressure behind applied internally. He releases his hold, watching as the man sags forward with relief._

The Doctor stands to her full height again, their gazes locked together for a moment longer before she turns to head towards Ryan and Yaz, leaving Graham and whatever is controlling his body alone together. _Brave heart, Graham_ , she thinks, knowing he can’t hear her but not having a choice but to leave him behind.

“The study is down the hallway and towards your left, by the way, Doctor.” He says, remaining seated. He watches as she turns back around, never saying anything, never needing to when her expression says it all. Icy and old, like he is. “You’ll find out what I am if you look through the journals.” He watches as she steps away again. “And perhaps I’ll figure out what you are in the meantime.” He says more quietly, not knowing if she picked up on it at all.

_He waits, hearing the Doctor meet back up for the younger humans and reassuring them that Graham’s okay, that he just needs to rest. He looks at Graham. “She didn’t tell them.”_

_Graham sits back, mirroring his doubles sitting position. “She wouldn’t, not yet at least, not until she knows what you are.”_

_He inclines his head to the side. “What is she, Graham? You never asked for her to tell you her species, but you know stuff about her. Two-hearts, ecto-spleen, the respiratory bypass system. All unique but hard to place when you don’t know her origin.”_

_“We never needed to know-” Graham says. “-probably better we didn’t anyway.” He finally looks up and into his own eyes. “She has a TARDIS; you know that, travels in space and time.”_

_The creature frowns, the information buried and reluctant to come forward at present. “She’s old; I know that much, something doesn’t get to have that look in their eyes if they haven’t lived for a few centuries.”_

_“Is that how old you are?”_

_He smirks and chuckles at Graham. “Oh, Graham, I’m older-” He enters Graham’s mind again, gently and with care as he looks through the man’s travels, pausing on one in particular. “You’ve been in space.”_

_“I wouldn’t recommend it.”_

_“I miss it.”_

_Graham stares back with a frown. “Why are you telling me this? Like I would care to know what you miss. You’re a lunatic, a malfunctioning piece of equipment or something.”_

_“Oh, no, I’m not equipment, Graham, I’m older than some of your civilisations back on your home planet.” He smiles sadly, eyes now looking up like he can see into the stars through the ceiling. “I was content and happy… back in my cluster with my brothers and sisters but I was knocked out of orbit and sent through the vast emptiness of space and away from them all.” He brings his eyes down. “It was beautiful there, green and bright and located by the Bezeta-Vordak system. Truly a sight to see.”_

_“What are you?”_

_“Not that anymore Graham-” He stands now, deciding that that’s enough wallowing in memories of what he once had. “-Either way, we need to prepare, because we’re about to have a very productive evening.”_

_Graham watches as he turns away from the direction that the Doctor, Ryan, and Yaz went and he wishes he could be with them instead of being forced to stay with the creature in control. He pulls himself upwards, following behind like a loyal dog._

_“She will stop you like she stopped that Dalek, and all the other creatures we faced together.”_

_He doesn’t reply to Graham because he knows she could, in theory, stop him, the possibility is actually there... He smiles again, and he can't help but feel excited at the prospect of that. “She’ll be a worthy opponent then, Graham.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor knows, but she hasn't told either Ryan or Yaz yet because, the Doctor and secrets OTP.  
> I had this planned differently but I wanted them to have a conversation before, pardon the language, shit hits the proverbial fan.  
> The creature respects her, doesn't mean it's still not going to try and kill them all though.
> 
> We'll be switching to the Doc, Ryan, and Yaz next while Graham and his 'friend' go and do some 'shady' things with a 'heart' ;)


	7. Chapter 7

Ryan and Yaz follow after the Doctor, sharing worried glances at the fast pace she’s making across the worn carpet on the upstairs landing. Booted feet hitting the ground hard.

“Doctor-” Yaz says, her hand reaching out and lightly taking hold of the Doctor’s arm. “-stop, please.”

The Doctor comes to a sudden halt, forcing both Ryan and Yaz to slam on the breaks at the same time, lest they collide into her back. “We have to go to the study-”

“I know we do, Doctor, but you came charging back into that room and ordered us to follow you without proper explanation.”

Ryan nods in agreement. “Then you said that my grandad was fine and that he just needed rest, but he ain’t fine, is he?” He taps his hand against his leg nervously, eyes flicking back the way they came. “Splitting up was the wrong idea, mate, you said it was when he suggested it and then when I did, so why was it good now? And with him by himself…”

The Doctor closes her eyes as she slumps against the wall; she steadies her breathing and looks up to Ryan. “No, he isn’t fine Ryan, he’s-”

“Then we shouldn’t have left him, Doctor-” Ryan interrupts, his body turning to head back and only stopping when the Doctor reaches out and holds onto his arm. “We don’t leave family behind, Doctor.” He shrugs his arm free, intent on heading back.

“Ryan, wait, something else is going on,” Yaz says, forcing Ryan to stop again. She fixates her gaze onto the Doctor, keen eyes noticing the barely contained storm on the alien woman's face. “What happened? Back when you two had your conversation.”

Ryan returns his eyes to the Doctor as well when she doesn't answer straight away, eyes locked onto the floor and away from their faces. “Doctor?”

“Graham-” The Doctor starts, mind trying to figure out the best way to say what needs to be told without scaring or freaking them out. “-Something has gotten into him… something that lives in the house or is the house, I'm not sure-” She shakes her head, skirting the subject entirely. “But he can’t be trusted, he just can’t, please believe me.”

“Oh, so we just leave him back there then cause he can’t be trusted? Cause he's argued with us, he said his blood sugar was low, and maybe he's just freaked out.” Ryan snaps back at her, missing what she’s getting at. “He’s in greater danger if we leave him by himself-”

“Ryan, he is the danger!” The Doctor throws back at him, shocking both of the younger humans into silence. She breathes out slowly. “He’s been the danger from the start, ever since you and me left the house- He’s-” She closes her eyes, breath hitching when she works out how long Graham has been stuck like this. _Hours_ … he’s been left alone with that creature taunting and hurting him, _oh Graham; I’m so sorry,_ she thinks in shame. “The house… or something that’s living within it has, and I’m reluctant to use the phrasing, has possessed him and is using his body.”

“Possessed? As in, like, a ghost?” Yaz digs, needing precise details. “I thought you said they weren’t real, Doctor.”

The Doctor shakes her head. “No, not a ghost- This is something else, something old and if I’m going to figure out what it is, we have to go to the study.”

“How do you know if what you’re looking for is actually in there, Doctor?” Yaz asks, eyes flicking to Ryan’s horror-stricken and frozen face at the revelation of what's happened to his grandad.

“It gave me directions there, told me to look at the journals if I want to know what it is.”

“And you’re sure you can trust it? You just said that Graham… or it can’t be trusted, so how do you know that there isn’t going to be a trap of some kind in there?”

The Doctor gestures wildly before bringing a hand up and rubbing the bridge of her nose. “We don’t-”

“Is he alive, Doctor?” Ryan’s voice finally cuts in, quiet and filled with worry. “I need to know if he’s-”

“He is,” She looks back at Ryan, and she steps closer, hands now resting on his forearms. “I will get him back, Ryan, I promise you that.” She turns from him, glancing at Yaz as well and seeing the worry on her face as well. “I should’ve picked this up earlier, caught it when it happened.”

“If you could've done that, you would’ve, Doctor.” Yaz encourages the alien woman. “Or we all could’ve spotted it, whatever it is.”

Ryan chews the inside of his mouth and then breathes out. “Me more than most, cause I live with him, Doctor, this ain’t just on you-” He sighs. “You said that whatever got him, attacked or something when we went outside?” The Doctor nods. “Then it moves fast, or it picked him out when we arrived.”

“Why would it pick Graham, though?” Yaz ponders, her left hand rubbing her temple as she gestures with the right. “What made him the ideal target?”

“We won’t know standing here,” The Doctor reminds them, her head turning towards the study. “Whatever it is, the answers are in there… we need only find it, and then I can work out a way to stop it… and a way to get Graham back in control, or at least temporarily… just enough for us to leave.”

“Leave?” Ryan says, suddenly. “What do you mean?”

“Go back to the TARDIS, and into safety where I can-”

“But Graham won’t be safe, Doctor, even if we make it back to the TARDIS, it'll still be in him.”

“I know that Ryan,” The Doctor looks back at them. “The creature said it needed a body and I don’t think it’ll give up Graham… it’s vindictive, and I think it likes him or likes toying with its new plaything anyway, but the TARDIS has ways to protect him.” _And us_ , she doesn't add. "At least until I can figure out how to separate them from each other."

Yaz glances at Ryan, both of their faces looking horrified and scared. “So we find out what it is and then go from there, Doctor, these are what if’s at the moment. We need concrete evidence on what it is before we act.”

The Doctor nods and takes a step towards the study, her hand held out behind her as she enters… just in case Yaz was right, and this room is trapped. Satisfied that it isn’t, she gestures for Ryan and Yaz to follow her in.

Yaz turns her eyes to the room, using what she was taught in the police force to note down every bit of detail she can see, and she spots what they’re looking for instantly. “You said we’re looking for journals, right Doctor?” The Doctor turns and focuses on where Yaz is looking. “I think we hit the jackpot.”

Ryan comes forward as well now, eyes roving across the stacked books. Some decayed beyond use, others looking newer. “There has to be hundreds here, how could we possibly find what we need in this!” He says, gesturing upwards.

Yaz frowns and then a memory hits her; she turns to the Doctor. “The dates!”

The Doctor widens her eyes, catching on. “Oh, Yasmin Khan, you really are fantastic.” She says, flashing a genuine smile at her, enough to alleviate the stress of the situation at the moment anyway. “We find the journals dated in and around those dates… if they were in the house during the time, it was abandoned than it stands to reason that whoever owned this place may have made a note of what we’re looking for."

Yaz nods and heads towards the bookshelf, finger brushing against each spine and in search for the date- “Got them, Doctor.”

“Great,” The Doctor turns to Ryan. “Clear a space on that desk, Ryan, we’ve got some reading to do, Fam-” The word dies on her lips when she stares back at Ryan and Yaz’ faces when they all notice Graham’s absence.

Ryan recovers fastest, determined to figure what the creature is that has his grandad overriding the hurt of him missing. “Come on… we’ll get him back… like we got my dad back from that Dalek.”

The Doctor watches as Ryan makes his way over to the desk, quietly and head bowed. She shares a glance with Yaz, both thinking the same thought. This isn’t the first time that Ryan has had to watch someone he loves stolen away from him.

* * *

 

_Graham wonders after the creature as they head downwards and towards a cellar. “Your heart is in the cellar?”_

_The creature looks back at Graham like he’s stupid. “No, Graham, we’re just going down here for the fun of it, I actually left it on the mantelpiece in the living room-" He rolls his eyes."-that boy was correct; you do have a knack for stating the obvious.”_

_“That boy has a name.”_

_He turns back around and shrugs. “I really don’t care for names… not when they’re not important.”_

_“You use mine and the Doc’s though.”_

_“Cause you two are-” He waves a hand through the air as he travels down the stairs. “-She is due some form of respect for being a worthy opponent… even if I plan on killing her because in all my years I’ve never met anyone like her, so she earns the right to be called by her name.”_

_“What about me, then?”_

_He shrugs again and doesn’t answer as he pulls the older looking door open and steps inside, breathing deeply with his eyes closed. It’s been too long that he’s physically stood in his sanctuary._

_Graham follows in after, his eyes darting around the space and landing on a skeleton propped against the far wall. “Friend of yours?” He asks, pulling a face at the morbid reality of it all. Who keeps a corpse in their bedroom… well, they usually keep skeletons in closets he supposes._

_He opens his eyes, confused, and then they land on the skeleton. “Oh, Anna!” He walks forward, bending slightly and picking up the skull and patting it. “Long time no see Lady Stewart; you look a little thin around the edges.”_

_“Do you have to pick the creepy skull up with my own hands and talk to it like you're bleeding Hamlet?” Graham says, mind wondering if grave desecration counts if he’s technically not in control of his body._

_He turns and grins, holding the skull to his face. "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio," He waves the skull at Graham, and then spots the repulsed look on his face. "Oh, come on, Graham, that was funny, and anyway you brought up that play cause how else would I know it if you didn't think about it first?"_

_Graham runs a hand down his face and looks back at the creature, still watching him. "Does respect of the dead mean nothing to you?"_

_He waves his concern away. "She’s an old friend of mine, Graham,” He looks down at the skull still held within his hands. “Kinda, in a way cause, we go way back.” He explains turning back to Graham again. “And I haven’t seen her in such a long time.”_

_That’s when Graham catches the glint of metal on the skulls head with a green type jewel sat within its centre. “Is that-”_

_“Me?” He finishes, already knowing what Graham was going to ask. “It is.”_

_“I expected you to be,” Graham shrugs, careful not to anger the creature in front of him. “Bigger.”_

_“I was Graham,” He looks forward. “I flew through the stars… and then crashed on this rock, pieces of me burnt up and then… she-” He glares at the skull. “-When they realised they couldn’t harness my energy… even after I tried to converse with them, tried to show that I was alive... She decided that she liked the colour of my glow and begged her husband to get the stone worker to cut into my flesh.”_

_Graham frowns as he slowly pieces it together, the mention of stone and flying through space, slotting it together quickly. “You’re a meteorite, a sentient meteorite, how?”_

_He nods. "Well, what’s left of me anyway after they cut the rest away to make this blasted tiara, Graham.” He laughs, dark and without humour. “Do you sympathise with me now, Graham? Do you understand why I do what I do?"_

_Graham walks forward to take a closer look at the jewel. “Honestly? No, cause we all had shit done to us, and we all had the decision on what we’d do after it, and most don’t become serial killers.”_

_“You nearly became a murderer, Graham.”_

_Graham stares at the creature. “I did and I ain’t hiding from that, but I chose not to-”_

_“You were weak then, or perhaps not because you picked the other option. Kept your hands clean as you torture him into insanity-” He raises his head to stare back at Graham. “I know what it’s like to be trapped and locked within something-” The slight movement in his hands causes Graham to flick his eyes to the tiara. “-and you willingly chose to do that to someone… we’re not so different, Graham, under different circumstances you could’ve been me.”_

_“We’re nothing alike-” Are they? What he decided to do to Tzim-Sha sounded… like the right idea at the time but he’s not so sure now. He gets brought out of his thoughts at the sound of laughter._

_“You doubt yourself now.”_

_Graham glares at the creature, wanting to turn the conversation away from his own moral ambiguity. “So you got your revenge on her, fine… I get that, I really do but why all the others...after her?”_

_“Why not? They insisted on coming here, each one looking to loot the place, they all deserved it as much as she did. Lady Anna Stewart, on the surface a prim and proper woman but on the inside, vain and just as vindictive as the rest of them.”_

_“So that’s why you killed them all, but you mentioned kids-” Graham clenches his own hand at his side. “Killing kids is never right; what could've they done to you?”_

_The creature shrugs with indifference. “I didn’t care… I just wanted her to suffer like she made me suffer.” He brushes a hand against the tiara, power flooding through his hand and into his body. “Do you feel that, Graham? That power-”_

_Graham’s eyes get drawn to the jewel again, the intensity of it is hard to look away from, and he realises how easily he was drawn in now, the strange alien feeling buzzes inside him._

_“Intoxicating, isn’t it?” He places the skull down again, carefully. “I like to leave it on her head as a reminder and-” He brings his hands upwards and points to his head. “-you have a bigger head than she did, which is a shame really, cause I think you’d pull the look off.”_

_Graham blinks at the creature as he smirks back at him._

_“Now, that’s enough of that Graham, let’s go meet back up with the Fam, minus you of course and see what they found-” He turns and walks away, never stopping. “-Oh, and to kill them because I’m done messing around.”_

* * *

 

The Doctor looks down at the gathered information in front of her, her brain piecing it all together, slowly… antagonising slowly with what she has to go on, which isn’t much. A meteorite crashing into a lake wouldn’t normally arouse suspicion, but it’s the only thing that lines up during the time frame.

“Ryan, Yaz.” The Doctor says, making them both look up from their own journals, ones she decided weren’t as important, but maybe she was wrong. “What do yours say?”

Yaz gestures down at hers. “Honestly, really not much in this one. Just speaks about the power problems they had and the hope that they could harness the power within the meteorite.”

“Power problems?”

“Yeah, they had issues with their solar panels in the winter,” She says, looking up at the Doctor. “And the meteorite glowed, they thought it had the power within it.”

This sounds familiar to her… but lots of meteorites have hidden power within them, and it could’ve come from anywhere in the universe.

Yaz goes to add more but stops when Ryan makes a startled noise. They both turn to look at him with inquisitive expressions. “Ryan?”

“I got a picture of it, Doctor!” He says already making his way over to her. “Look.”

She accepts the journal from him, turning it over, so it’s facing the right way. “It’s green-” She frowns, the possible origin of the meteorite on the tip of her tongue. “-argh… it’s there; I’ve heard stories, stuff Granny five told me.”

“Granny five?” Ryan asks, puzzled.

“She was my favourite Ryan, told the best bedtime stories when I couldn’t sleep, and I’m sure she spoke about this, just-” Her frown deepens. “-it’s on the tip of my tongue."

Yaz stares down at her own journal, having read further and stumbling onto the fate of the space rock. “What would happen if they cut into it, Doctor?”

The Doctor looks up, placing the book with the picture in it down and moving over to Yaz. “What have you found?”

“It says that the wife of the man who lived here liked the glow to it and after they figured out it couldn’t be harnessed for the power inside they paid the stone worker to cut away the outer layer to get at the glow within.”

“Why would they do that?” Ryan says, walking over as well.

Yaz reads further. “She wanted it to be made into a-

“Tiara.”

The Doctor spins, hands grabbing over the wrists of Ryan and Yaz and forcing them behind her as she looks up into the eyes and face of her friend. "You! I see you've completed your business."

"Bingo," He says, face cruel as he steps into the room. “Hello Fam, I really hope you figured out what I am before you die, would be a shame for you to die not knowing.” He says, holding the cruel gaze and then morphing Graham’s face into a friendly smile for the briefest of seconds before he rushes into the room. Intent only to kill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To anyone wondering what the creature is.  
> It was in a Sarah Jane Adventures episode called 'Day Of The Clown" and funnily enough, Bradley Walsh played the villain and was horrifying in it if you hate clowns. Like a PG version of Stephen Kings IT.
> 
> The creature I made is from the same place. It's a meteorite from the Jeggorabax Cluster and the creatures living inside the cluster feed on emotions.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was meant to get this up yesterday but I couldn't get my head into writing it after work.
> 
> Popping a warning on this one: It gets dark and people get hurt.

The Doctor latches her hands on Ryan and Yaz’ forearms, forcing them behind her and away from the approaching creature inhabiting Graham’s body. She backs away, circling the desk and flicking her eyes towards the door. “Before you kill us-” The creature continues forward, his intense gaze locked on them all. “-Do you have a name? Because we can’t keep calling you It, and I’m definitely not calling you Graham because you’re not the kind man we all know and care for-”

“I have no need for names, Doctor.” He pauses, head cocked to one side. “And he’s far from kind because I know what he and-” He waves his hand at Ryan. “-that boy did to that other creature. Locked him up, found that out when I ripped the memory from Graham’s mind.”

_“Still hate when you do that,” mumbles Graham, feeling next to useless as he watches himself follow after his friends and family._

The Doctor narrows her eyes ever so slightly. Her anger and worry for Graham grows. She doesn’t know what this creature has been saying to him, or even doing to him for the past few hours. She levels a glare at him as she herds Ryan and Yaz behind her further and towards the door. “Fine, if you have no name and you’re currently not the man we know and love, how about Not-Graham?”

“You really gonna name it, Doctor, while it’s trying to kill us?” Yaz splutters.

“She’s stalling for time, girl.” The creature says while taking his leisurely stroll around the desk. “And you can call me whatever you want; it doesn’t matter in the end.” He runs a hand across the journals, eyes darting down to see what they looked at. “You found what I looked like then, did you figure it out, Doctor?”

“You’re a meteorite.”

“Obviously-” He pauses. “-How about you tell me what you are and I’ll tell you what I am, sound like a deal?”

“I don’t deal with sociopaths.” The Doctor answers, eyes flicking to the door before pushing Ryan and Yaz out behind her. “Graham, I know you can hear me- I’ll fix this, I will.”

_Graham looks over to her anxiously, praying that she figures it out, and soon- He doesn’t want to hurt them. Even if he’s not the one doing it, it’s still him, his body, doing it and that’s something he’s not sure he could live with._

“Promises, Doctor.” He smirks at her, eyes narrowed. “Shouldn’t make them if you can’t keep them.”

The Doctor doesn’t reply as she steps out of the study, slamming the door shut, her hand pulling out her sonic and aiming it at the lock.

“Is that gonna keep him in there?” Ryan asks.

“Nope, and he’s right… it’s just to-” The Doctor starts, stopping when the door gets pulled inwards. “Stall… you know I thought it would’ve lasted longer than that if I’m honest.” She grabs onto Ryan and Yaz’ arms again, pulling them down the hall and towards the landing. “You know what, I think I will call you Not-Graham because mean space rock is a mouthful."

“Where are you planning on running too, Doctor?” Not-Graham calls out after her. “There is nowhere in this house that you can hide from me.”

“Not trying to hide, trying to think-” The Doctor yells back, thoughts spiralling. If she could get a hold on him again, then maybe- but it risks Graham’s life.

Yaz looks behind her, seeing the edge of the bannister nearing them. “Doctor, we’re going to have to take a right or left soon cause we’re coming up to the landing.” She asks in a hushed tone.

The Doctors eyes widen a fraction as a thought hits her, oh Graham isn’t going to be too happy with it, but it separates them for the time being. “Go left-”

“Shouldn’t we had downstairs, where this thing isn’t?” Ryan points out, voice barely audible.

“Not for what I have planned, guys.” She replies, voice lowered.

Not-Graham saunters forward, taking his time and drawing out his approach with a sigh. “You know it’s rude to whisper.” He smiles at them, drawing their attention. “And Graham is old after all; he might have some sage advice for you lot if you only come closer and tell us your secrets.”

Ryan glares at Not-Graham, but his heart aches at the grandfatherly smile on his face. “You’re not my grandad.”

_Graham can’t help the hurt expression that appears on his face. Of course, Ryan didn’t direct it at him… but to hear- He clenches his hands at his side, face becoming angry as he stares at the detestable creature._

Not-Graham side eyes Graham, noticing the look of rage on his face. “Say that again, boy because the expression on Graham’s face is priceless.”

“Ryan, don’t, it’s just goading you,” Yaz says quickly as she notices Ryan about to retort. “It wants a reaction from you.”

“The girl is clever, Doctor, but I know why you really have her around. Seen it in Graham’s mind, well he’s seen it, but he’s just never wanted to point it out.” He says, approaching them a little bit quicker now. “You like to keep her near because you like someone who looks at you with faith and adoration, don’t you, but does she really know what you are?” His smile grows. “We’re alike, Doctor, we’ve both got blood on our hands… haven’t we?”

_"That's not true," Graham says, his anger growing._

Yaz’ expression turns icy at that, the comment digging in as she looks to the Doctor. “No, you’re saying that to distract me and her, you did it with Ryan, and now you’re doing it to us.”

_Graham looks to her with pride. “She’s smarter than you think, she’s logical and-”_

“And she dies first, Graham, thank you for the suggestion!” He interrupts out loud this time, causing the trio to startle as he makes a dash towards them, impossibly fast for a man of Graham’s age. 

_Graham looks on in horror, unable to do anything to stop him at all and he feels so unequivocally useless._

The Doctor yanks Yaz back, but finds resistance when Not-Graham latches his hand around her jacket, his strong arms pulling her towards him and out of the Doctor’s hold. “YAZ!”

“Say goodbye to her, Doctor,” He says as Yaz tries to struggle but finds her arm painfully pinned behind her back as he snakes his free arm around her neck, tightening the hold. “I’ll snap her-”

The Doctor shoves past Ryan and goes for Not-Graham’s throat with a jab, sending the creature back with a startled cough. She pulls Yaz towards her, the young woman herself coughing and pushes her towards Ryan. “Stay back, you two… and do not help!” She yells as she lowers her feet into a fighting stance.

_Graham struggles for breath, the pain in his throat sharp. He looks to his double, seeing the creature itself coughing._

“Change of plans!” Not-Graham says, standing to his full height and rubbing at his throat. “You’re going to die first-”

Not-Graham charges forward again, but the Doctor uses his momentum against him, sending him into the bannister and weakening it slightly.

“Venusian aikido, the best defence-” She yelps when she feels him kick his leg out, sending her to the floor in a heap. “Oof-”

Not-Graham sneers down at her, his legs propelling him forward. “Once you’re dead, Doctor, your human friends will be next, and I will make it-”

The Doctor flicks her eyes to the weakened bannister and sends a mental apology to Graham for what she’s about to do. “You really shouldn’t talk when you have the upper hand, mate, as I just learnt,” 

He frowns as she kicks out, leg connecting with Not-Graham’s groin and sending him into the bannister and over the edge. “Lesson one in hand-to-hand combat when you’re fighting for your life, play dirty, guys.” She says looking over to Ryan and Yaz, both who stare back with terrified eyes.

_“There’s playing-” Graham groans, not finishing his sentence as he doubles over in pain, knees hitting the upstairs landing. Honestly, he never expected the Doctor ever to kick him there, and the sudden flash of pain in his arm is masked by the one he finds in his ‘delicate organs’ to politely put it, because they are hurting a damn sight more at the moment- Yeah... he stares at the Doctor, tears forming in his eyes. “You had to kick me in the bleeding nads, didn’t you, Doc?”_

Ryan’s eyes widen, and he rushes forward, horrified and as a man, wincing himself. “Grandad!”

The Doctor glances at Yaz, checking to see if she’s okay and nodding when she gives a thumbs up before making her way to Ryan’s side and looking over. “Sorry, Graham.” She calls out to the room below, spotting the imposter using his body lying prone on the ground. “Spent my entire life as a man before this regeneration and I have to say, I don’t miss being kicked there.”

_“Oh, I’m going... to feel that in the morning,” Graham grunts out while pulling himself over to the bannister, tears still in his eyes and looking at himself on the floor. “Did you really have to do that, Doc? Isn’t there a code or something, Fam members don’t kick other members in the bloody bollocks?” She doesn’t answer, not that he expected her to as he rolls onto his back, groaning._

“You kicked him off, Doctor!” Ryan exclaims.

“In my defence, he was trying to kill me.”

“Fair enough, good as an excuse as any other-” Ryan says, but he winces again. “I just hope you never kick me there; I mean you have boots on and that, ow.”

Their conversation trails away as Not-Graham stands, freakish and with all pretence of humanity gone from him. “By hurting me, Doctor, you hurt Graham… I don’t care about the pain, but he sure does.”

_For the first time since this entire mess begins, Graham finds himself agreeing with the creature._

“If you weren’t trying to kill us, I wouldn’t have kicked you off.” The Doctor responds looking over and at Not-Graham’s body, spotting the arm bent out of shape with blood running down it and coating Graham’s shirt.

Not-Graham catches where she’s looking and frowns at the offending arm. “You broke my arm.”

“Technically, I broke Graham’s arm.” The Doctor counters back at Not-Graham. “Seeing that you’re currently joyriding in his body.”

Not-Graham glares at the arm, moving it and then cracking it back into place. The sound reverberating around the hall. “It doesn’t matter,” Not-Graham raises his arm, the torn flesh knitting itself back together. “That’s handy,” He jokes, waving the now uninjured arm and hand at them.

“That’s a sound I never want to hear again, Doctor,” says Ryan, looking thoroughly sick.

The Doctor pulls Ryan back and then darts her eyes around the upstairs landing. “We just have to stay ahead of Not-Graham while I figure something out,” She glances over the bannister again, eyes watching Not-Graham meandering around downstairs.

_“You probably wanna figure something out quick, Doc,” Graham says, looking at them, the pain lessening with each passing second._

“We can’t-” Yaz starts, stopping to rub at her throat.

The Doctor quickly heads to her side, her hands gentle on the younger woman’s throat and seeing the bruising appearing across her neck. “Any lasting pain, Yaz?” 

Yaz shakes her head. “Was… a shock… really.” She croaks out.

_Graham looks over as well, his eyes catching on her neck and staring in horror at what his hands did to the girl he considers just as much as a grandchild as he does Ryan. He stands, ignoring the pain within him and stares down in hate at the creature parading around in his body. “You didn’t have to hurt her; she didn’t do anything to you! None of them have!” He shouts this time feeling the rumble through the house._

Not-Graham looks up as well, not saying anything as he storms to towards the stairs.

“We gotta move, Doctor,” Ryan says, spotting the creature moving to head towards them. “Is there another way down, cause we can’t stay up here with him following after us.”

“I don’t know, Ryan,” The Doctor replies while helping Yaz and holding onto her hand. She reaches out to Ryan who accepts, and they head off again, Not-Graham’s footsteps always behind them.

They’ve been rushing around for a while, aimlessly and hopelessly lost in the house and it’s not long until Ryan feels the stitch in his side. “Doctor… where are we running to?”

The Doctor stops, listening intently for the sound of footsteps and only relaxing a minor amount when she hears nothing. “Need to figure something out.”

Yaz leans against the wall, lungs sucking in needed mouthfuls of air. “Can’t you summon the TARDIS here… like you did back on that planet?”

The Doctor shakes her head. “She doesn’t like being summoned, and I wouldn’t be able to anyway, there’s too much interference here.”

“So we truly are stuck with a madman parading around as my grandad?”

“If I could just figure out what he is, then I could-” She stops, racking brain for anything that could be useful. “Meteorite, alive and green-” She widens her eyes when it comes to her. “ _Jeggorabax!_ ”

“What?” Ryan exclaims completely lost.

“Jeggorabax, Ryan, that’s where the creature is from. Living meteorites and they feed on emotions; it’s a dark nebula… Granny five used to tell us bedtime stories about them.”

“But this one never said anything about feeding on emotions Doctor, it just wants to kill us,” Yaz says, deciding to ignore the fact that the Doctor was told about this horrifying species as a kid.

The Doctor frowns. “It didn’t… and-” Her frowns deepens. “Why isn’t it just manifesting itself?”

“What do you mean, Doctor?” Ryan asks this time.

The Doctor paces against the floor. “They usually take on the appearance of the people from the planet they land on, so why isn’t it just using the appearance of a human here? Why does it need Graham?”

Yaz thinks the issue over. “They cut it open, Doctor… would that have any effect on it?”

Ryan gestures at Yaz. “You said they made it into a tiara… the woman of the bloke who lived here liked it, didn’t she?”

“So they cut into it, took away parts of it and made it into a tiara… still doesn’t fully-”

There’s footsteps at the top of the corridor again. “They cut my flesh away, caused me great pain and ignored me when I screamed at them to stop-” Graham’s voice says, the same but hostile and threatening. “-She just wanted a tiara, and she got one… she just never counted on me worming my way into her brain and destroying her from the inside as I did to her family.”

The Doctor looks up, spotting Not-Graham stood at the far end of the hallway. “Caught up with us then?”

“Yep, easy enough really-” Not-Graham says as he strolls into the hallway like it’s a sunny day in a park. “She was the first person I took over when I realised I couldn’t manifest myself properly, and I got better at it over the years.”

“And how long have you been here?”

Not-Graham pauses, head cocked to one side. “Centuries-” He gestures towards where the village would be. “-The people in the village don’t know what happened here now, they just know to stay away.”

“Why haven’t you killed them, the people in the village?” Ryan asks with venom. “Cause you’re intent on killing us.”

Not-Graham narrows his eyes at Ryan. “You entered my home, invited yourselves in… the least I could do was give you a proper welcome, son. Grace always told the pair of us that-”

“STOP!” Ryan yells, taking a step towards him but staying out of arms reach when the Doctor grabs onto his jacket. “You’re not him, you’ll never be my grandad-,” Ryan throws back. “Give him back to me!”

_Graham paces around the corridor, eyes locked onto himself and hands clenched at his sides. “Leave them alone!”_

_“Graham you’re going to give yourself a heart attack if you don’t calm down…” He says to him, but bristles under the constant emotion rolling of the human man. His own hands now clenching… and that’s not his doing- No, this isn’t good… if he figures it out, find a way to fight back-_

“You want him back?” Not-Graham says quickly and thinking fast. “Then have him-” He pauses, closing his eyes and pulling Graham forward… while he buries himself further.

_“Have fun, Graham,” He says as Graham looks at him, the rage bleeding from his face and turning to puzzlement as his body starts to feel weird and unpleasant. “Of course, I’m still in control.”_

The first thing Graham actually feels is the chill of his skin and the air on his face as he snaps his head up, eyes darting around. He places an arm out to the wall, tentatively, hand brushing against the mouldy wallpaper and feeling it.

“What is it doing, Doctor?” Ryan asks, his head lent down to the Doctors.

“I don’t know, Ryan.”

Graham lifts his head up again, finally setting his eyes on his friends and family. “Doc?” He stares down at his hands, rubbing them together, the coldness on them horrible, before looking up again. “It’s given me control-” He winces, a hand grabbing at his chest when he feels pressure being applied.

_“I said I’m still in control, Graham, the boy asked for me to give you back to him and I granted that request because it suited me.” There is a pause across the bond they share. “Talk fast, Graham.” He explains, distracting Graham for the time being as he digs in deeper._

“He’s allowing me to speak to you,” Graham says, eyes flicking to each of them and then finally landing on Yaz. “I’m so sorry, Yaz-”

“No,” Ryan shakes his head, anger on his face as he gestures at Graham. “NO! This is just a trick, it’s pretending to be him again just to mess with us.”

Graham stares at Ryan. “Look, son-”

“Don’t call me son!” Ryan yells, his feet edging him that little bit closer. “I’m not your son.”

Graham stares back, heart breaking at the tone in Ryan’s voice. He flicks his eyes to the Doctor; the thought he has quick, and he knows there’s going to be hell to pay for it. “Doc…” He can feel the creature doing something, but its attention is elsewhere for the time being… he might have time.

“The cellar, it’s in the cellar-” He screams out, the pain hot and like nothing he’s ever experienced before cutting him off as his knees give out, sending him to the floor. “Tiara, cellar!” He throws out before feeling his throat becoming raw from the agony that the creature is causing inside.

“Graham!” The Doctor calls out feet heading towards him.

Graham catches her in his peripheral vision. “Don’t, it’s still-” He clutches a hand around his waist, the ability to speak getting lost in the pain flashing through his body.

“What’s happening, Doctor?” Yaz questions.

“It’s hurting him,” The Doctor answers with horror. She never wanted to hear any of her new friends scream like that… and it’s going to haunt her for a long time.

The creature rips itself forward, pushing Graham back down but still causing the intense pain as it drags itself back up to a kneeling position but it’s unsteady on its feet, body wavering ever so slightly. “That was stupid, Graham and you will pay for that.”

“What are you doing to him?” The Doctor demands.

The creature stares at her. “I’m ripping into him constantly and healing it all and repeating the process-” The Doctor looks on, anger and loathing written across her features while Ryan and Yaz look sick. “He’s screaming, Doctor, but he deserves it like you all will-”

The Doctor places her arms around Ryan and Yaz again, watching carefully and then backing away from it. It’s distracted, that much she can tell, with whatever it’s doing to Graham-

“We need to go to the cellar-” She glances behind her, hoping that whatever way they take will lead them back to the stairs. “I think whatever it is, is in there and that’s why it’s hurting-”

“It’s not hurting him, Doctor, it’s torturing him.” Yaz points out, and she looks over to Ryan, his eyes locked onto his Grandad and hands shaking. She reaches over and takes one of his.

“It’s doing it because he mentioned the cellar, we need to go there-” The Doctor says again, dragging them along.

“But it’s hurting-”

“The quicker we get there, the quicker we can sort this out.” The Doctor lays out, dragging the two younger humans with her and leaving Graham to his fate.

_Graham stares after them, voice hoarse and eyes wanting to be tightly shut while he finds any place to think about that isn’t this house, and that isn’t the severe pain currently tearing through him._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There should be about 12 chapters for the entire thing because I want to explore the 'after effects' of this entire ordeal.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've bumped this to Mature now due to the nature of the last chapter and this one.  
> We hit that "Oh, this is dark now."

The Doctor practically drags Ryan and Yaz down the stairs, two at a time in her rush to get to the cellar.

“Cellar, cellar, where would a manor house have a cellar!” The Doctor rambles, feet driving them all into the entrance hall where this entire mess first started. “Any ideas?!”

“Ain’t they like off the kitchen or something? Cause my Nan and Graham watched Downton Abby, and theirs was-”

“In the Kitchen, right, makes sense-” The Doctor interjects, grabbing hold of Ryan and Yaz again and taking them back down the hallway and into the kitchen. “Following Yaz’ theory that this is like an old English manor house, which would be quite nice right about now minus the evil space rock, then it should be-” She stops when her eyes hit the stairs heading downwards. “Good work, team!”

“Do you think he’s coming after us?” Ryan asks, looking back towards the door leading into the hallway.

“If I said no, it would be considered lying, instead I’m going to get us into the cellar, and we can block the door off while I try to figure out why Graham would tell us to come here at the risk to himself.” The Doctor answers while herding the two younger humans down the stairs and towards an old looking door.

“Can you open it?” Yaz asks.

The Doctor pushes against it, frowning when it doesn’t budge. She pulls out the sonic and aims it down at the lock, growing increasingly frustrated when that doesn’t work either. “No, it’s locked by the same forces. Sonic isn’t going to be able to break through.”

“Doctor, we’re sitting ducks here cause as soon as he gets to the top of those stairs we’ve got nowhere to go,” Yaz informs her with growing panic.

“I know,” The Doctor replies, mind running through every option that might get the door open and landing on one in particular. “It’s possible that that could work, he is telepathic, would make sense…”

“What’s possible?” Ryan demands, eyes darting to the Doctor’s face.

The Doctor doesn’t answer as she rests her hands against the door and starts to open herself up to the house, flinching slightly when she feels the rage and anger aimed at her, but she moves past that, focusing on the door instead and willing it to open.

_“NO!” He yells, causing the Doctor to snap her eyes open when she hears the creature through their brief connection. “I’m coming for you, Doctor.”_

_She narrows her eyes touches against the creature and Graham ever so quickly and feels ill at the pain it’s causing her older friend. “Graham, hang on!” She sends back to him, hardly knowing if he heard it through his screams before turning her attention back to the door and away from them._

She feels the door unlock under her mental persuasion and quickly breaks the connection. “Got it, get in!” The Doctor calls out, hand pushing the door open and feet rushing inside with Ryan and Yaz following after.

“What did you do, Doctor?”

“The creature is telepathic… I opened myself up to the house and unlocked the door-” Both Ryan and Yaz share confused glances that she picks up on. “-no time to explain how now because it’s angry and it’s coming.” She says while her eyes travel around the room and land on the tiara that Graham mentioned earlier.

Yaz looks around the room, spotting worn down furniture and shelving. “So we need to block the door off then with anything we can find, and quickly!” She says, getting herself and Ryan back on plan.

Ryan gives a swift nod and heads away quickly just as Yaz turns to the Doctor. “What are you-” She trails off when she catches what the Doctor is looking at, turning her gaze to stare at the alien woman. “You think that is what Graham was on about before-” She catches herself, voice breaking slightly when she remembers the screams. “-before it took control again?”

The Doctor nods. “Help Ryan, Yaz,” She says, giving them both tight looks. “Block the door with anything you can find, alright?”

She turns not waiting for a response and approaches the, quite frankly, innocent and well-crafted tiara with trepidation. She stares down at it on the skull of what she assumes is the long-dead wife that the journals and Not-Graham mentioned before edges closer, hand hovering over it and feeling the chill.

Glancing back at Ryan and Yaz she sees that they’re making progress, but she doesn’t have hope that the barricade will actually stop Not-Graham, it’ll slow him down, but this is his house after all and they are intruding.

Returning her gaze onto the tiara again and she feels something trying to brush against her that fails when she builds her own safeguards. She’s had a creature buried in her head before, cold and metallic; she’s not about to have a sentient meteorite do the same thing as well.

“Doctor!” Yaz calls out to her, making the Doctor look back over. “We’ve blocked it with what we can-” She says, while back away from the door. “-What is the plan?”

The Doctor stands straight again, eyes flicking back to the tiara and considering her options. “Not-Graham didn’t want us in here, why?”

“I’m not sure, Doctor, but it has something to do with that tiara,” Yaz says now looking at it properly for the first time and feeling the same pressure the Doctor felt behind her eyes. Unknown to her, her feet take her slightly forward-

_“Yes, go closer girl, you know you want to-” purred a voice, a blend of one she recognises and something malicious. “-It’ll look nice on you, and you have the same defences as dear old Graham, I’ll worm my way into your head as well as his.”_

She slams on the breaks and tears her eyes away from it as her heart thumps in her chest. “Did it-” She stares at the floor, not wanting to feel that again. “-Try to get inside your head, Doctor?” And she suddenly thinks about whether the same happened to Graham, only he couldn’t look away from it.

Ryan frowns at Yaz and goes to look up at it.

“Ryan, don’t!” The Doctor says, voice loud and commanding. “It’s had centuries worth of practice in getting into human brains-” She returns her gaze to it, the pressure there but easily ignored and blocked. “-But it’s never encountered me, and I’ve had experiences of things digging through my memories and controlling me. So I managed to resist him, fight back...” She turns back to Yaz again. “Yaz, what did you feel… when you looked at it, what did it want you to do exactly?”

“To put it on, Doctor-” She frowns. “-I think- I think it spoke to me, the voice was Graham’s and something else mixed together.” She swallows dryly. “It wanted to take me over, said about worming it’s way into my brain like it did to Graham.”

The Doctor furrows her brows, turning around, coat tails flapping behind her as she bends and stares at it closely. She pulls out her sonic again, scanning and reading the results. The energy is the same as what she’s picked up throughout the house but concentrated here- There’s an idea forming in her head, but it’s dangerous and possibly reckless. “I have an idea, it’s risky, but I’ve fought it off every time, I’m stronger than it is.”

A banging from the door pulls all their attention back to the issue at hand. The Doctor needs to make a decision and quick, and that’s her only option at this moment in time.

“Why can’t we just destroy it, Doctor? Just smash it to the ground-” Ryan demands quickly, his legs taking him away from the door and towards her but his eyes never catch on the tiara.

The Doctor gives it a moment of thought and then shakes her head. “That could unleash it completely-” Her brows creases further. “-It’s here, but it’s… manifested itself in Graham but if I- it’s… oh, it’s risky, but I know what it’s like-”

“To have something in your head?” Yaz finishes for her.

The Doctor nods, looking back up at them. “A creature called a Cyber-Planner burrowed into my brain once, back when I was the Chin- He called himself Mr Clever, and we played a game of chess to see who would gain control. Of course,he lost, which was my goal but…”

“What is your plan exactly, Doctor?” Yaz dares to ask, not liking where this is going. “And if you say “putting on that tiara’ then I’m going to say that that is the worst idea we've ever had.”

“I have to agree with her Doctor, that’s not a plan!” Ryan says, flinching back when the banging on the door disrupts the hastily constructed barricade. "What if it takes you over as well?"

“But I’m clever, really clever, and I have defences in place-” She looks back at the tiara again as another loud bang echoes through the cellar. “He’s coming through, and this is the only idea I... we have.” She reaches forward just as the door bursts free from its hinges, showering wooden planks inwards and onto them with a clatter.

Not-Graham stares with absolute rage at the three of them, the intensity of his gaze aimed at them via Graham’s face not so easily forgotten. He spots the Doctor reaching for the tiara, and his Not-Graham's blue eyes widen.

“Are you sure you want to pick that up, Doctor?” Not-Graham taunts, his legs driving him further into the room and straight for her. “Everyone else who’ve ever worn it has been taken over by me.”

“Oh, I have a high expectation that won’t be the case this time, Not-Graham.” The Doctor answers back and finally looking up in horror when she spots the appearance of Graham. “What have you done to _him_?”

They all take in his appearance or the state that he’s in any way as bile rises in their throats at the various blood patches on his shirt. He catches what they’re looking at and grins spitefully. “Graham had an unfortunate accident with a sharp object, but he’s fine… aren’t you, Graham? Oh wait, he can’t reply to you, but he assures me he’s fine!” Not-Graham says, his tone bordering on manic. “I’ve healed them, partially, well some- because it’s hard to move around while you’re bleeding, door handles often become so _slippery_.”

_Graham stumbles into the room as well, his face drawn and pale while hands grip around himself in pain. He flicks his eyes to the Doctor before falling to the floor, tired, exhausted and quite frankly pissed off. "Fuck you." He spits out in hate._

"Such language, Graham, and in front of your grandson? What would Grace say?" Not-Graham says out loud.

Yaz quickly bends and picks up a broken piece of wood, her gaze never leaving that of Not-Graham. “You won’t win.” She says, stepping into his path. “We’ll stop you, and we’ll get Graham back.”

Not-Graham pauses in front of her, eyes going to the broken plank in her hands. “You’re going to use that? Because if you hurt me, you hurt Graham, girl-” He continues forward, legs changing direction and heading to Yaz when he considers her the more significant threat.

_Graham’s anger and panic grow. He pulls himself forward, disregarding the stabbing pains as Yaz and the creature move further away. “STOP!” He shouts, anger turning to rage. “You won’t use me to hurt them!”_

Not-Graham stumbles, his legs suddenly feeling like he’s wading through water, but he continues and fights through it, each step getting easier. “I will do what I want!” He shouts back, for the room to hear and uses his own rage to push Graham back down. 

Yaz steps back, fear rising within her as he approaches and the ache in her throat flares up, reminding her of what he did. She steps back again, breath hitching-

“You’re terrified of this face now, aren’t you, girl?” sneers Not-Graham, eyes flicking to watch Ryan as he starts to approach carefully. He points to him. “Boy, don’t think I’ve forgotten about you… because I have extra special plans for _you_.”

Ryan clenches his hands and stops, eyes flicking back to the Doctor. “Doctor, just do it whatever it is you’re planning to do, just do it!”

Not-Graham flicks his eyes to the Doctor as well, watching her and becoming frustrated by the two humans blocking his path. He looks to Ryan again. “I’m going to let Graham be in control when I kill you, boy, let him feel your blood on his hands as he and I cut into your flesh as they did to me!” He quickly jumps forward, catching Yaz entirely off guard in the distraction tactic and lifts her off her feet. “After I take her out of the picture.”

“YAZ!” Ryan shouts as the Doctor looks up, her hands now wrapping around the skull and tiara.

Not-Graham uses his strength to throw Yaz into the adjacent wall, the sound harsh and echoing through the room as she falls to the ground unconscious. Not-Graham turns to Ryan next, but he catches the Doctor pulling the tiara off the skull.

The touch she has on the metal and jewel causes him to stumble, eyes wide when he feels the touch of her mind entirely for the first time. It’s suffocating and old, so very _old_. “NO!” He yells, he can’t allow her to place it on her head, can’t be forced back into there again- His legs drive him forward but towards Ryan, the lad tripping backwards when Not-Graham smashes his body into him. "Get here, boy!"

There’s a scuffle, but Not-Graham succeeds in getting the upper hand as he locks his arm around Ryan’s throat. He snaps his head to the Doctor, seeing her so close to putting it on now. “ _STALEMATE_!” He shouts, and she stops, eyes horror-stricken when she spots his arm and hand wrapped around Ryan’s neck. “You put that tiara on, and I will snap his neck, his death will be on your hands.”

_Graham tears his eyes away from Yaz’ body and the blood stain on her head and towards himself and Ryan when Not-Graham calls out to the room. “Ryan,” He looks to the creature, his emotions on the brink of tipping over. “Don’t you dare!”_

“ _Stalemate_ ,” The Doctor echoes his statemate and hers from earlier, hands lowering the tiara from her head.

Not-Graham relaxes his hold on Ryan. “I let you, the girl, and the boy leave… without fighting you. You’re free to go but I keep Graham.”

“No,” The Doctor glowers back at him. “I’m not leaving without Graham, that’s not an option.”

“He’s mine.” Not-Graham answers. “We’re connected already, and that’s my condition-” He cocks his head to the side. “-the Boy or Graham, you have a choice to make, Doctor.”

“What do you mean?” Her hands shake, eyes locked onto the scared expression on Ryan’s face. She glances over to Yaz, horrified at the crumpled body but breathing a sigh of relief when she catches her chest rising and falling with life.

“Well, I’m giving you the option to leave with the girl and boy but if you refuse- if you put that tiara on, then the boy dies, and you leave with the girl and Graham, so it’s your choice in the end, Doctor.”

Ryan struggles in Not-Graham’s grip, choking when the arm tightens around his throat. “Don’t let him keep my grandad, Doctor, please-” Ryan begs, knowing full well that if she picks that option, Graham will be tortured and he couldn’t live with himself knowing that they’ve left him to that fate. “He’ll be tortured.”

_Graham stands, unsteadily and through the pain. “Get your hands off him!” He shouts with outrage. “GET MY HANDS OFF HIM!”_

Not-Graham finds his arms and hands unwillingly loosening, his eyes going wide as he turns to face Graham. “No… I won’t be-” He growls, trying his hardest to fight against the fury of a scared grandad and failing. " _NO_."

The Doctor catches where he’s looking, her eyes darting around like she expects to see Graham. She grins, face turning into one of pride. “Seems you discounted someone, mate,” She says, the tiara coming upwards again. “And you currently have his grandson in your grip-” She places the tiara above her head, eyes wincing slightly when the icy feeling starts to brush against her mind. “You wanted to know what I am?” She pauses, eyes locked onto the now panicked ones of Not-Graham. “Why don’t I show you!?” 

She pulls the tiara down onto her head as the creature drops Ryan to the floor. His body moving towards her pointlessly as she rips into the tiara painfully. 

“You wanted control, well I’m going to show you how to do it properly! I’m going to show you the fury of a _Time Lord_!”

Not-Graham feels the connection to Graham give out and fade away as he’s yanked out of his mind and forced into the Doctor's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is pissed.
> 
> I was actually going to write this chapter completely different but I suddenly thought about the way I wrote it today, just after I posted chapter eight yesterday and had to decide.
> 
> Option A or Option B. 
> 
> B it was.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short one today.

_The first thing he feels, or rather he sees is an image of his home, and he reaches for it, hands wanting to touch and feel it again._

_“I wouldn’t bother if I was you,” cuts in a feminine voice from everywhere at once. “It’s just a memory or an imagination of the Jeggorabax Cluster, never been myself, just going on what Granny five told us.”_

_He blinks around the inky blackness of space and then focuses on the apparition of the Doctor. “You-” He stands taller, mind trying to dig into hers and finding nothing but a wall firmly held in place._

_“That’s not going to work here, mate, I’m in control.” The Doctor says, stepping closer, her face blank and expressionless. “And I don’t have to hide myself here,”_

_"You pulled me out of Graham's mind, how?"_

_"Time Lord beats rock."_

_He thinks back, finally realising what she is in front of him. "You're legends; they said you all died-"_

_"Greatly exaggerated."_

_"What are you going to do to me?"_

_"You hurt my friends, and that's never a wise thing to do." She says, waving an arm and conjuring an image of her Fam. “And I'm angry which means I don’t have to be kind; I could destroy you right now. Make it so you can never hurt anyone ever again-”_

_“So why haven’t you?” He dares to ask, watching her as she steps closer to her friends. “I hurt them-”_

_“Destroying you would be too simple.” The Doctor answers, her eyes locked onto the image of Graham, smiling and looking uninjured and whole. She turns back suddenly. “You tortured an honest and good man, mentally and physically. You hurt my friend- I am well within my rights to rip you apart atom by atom, painfully and repeatedly for what you did you to him!” She steps closer, eyes wild and dangerous. “And he would never know I did it.”_

_He swallows, pointless now considering he has no physical body. “I was right about you, we’re alike-” He snorts. “-do it then Doctor I’ve felt pain before.”_

_The Doctor snorts herself. “Oh, I’m not going to do that to you- as you said, you’ve felt pain before.” She leans in closer, grin wide and eyes dark. “I’m going to do something much worse, something you truly fear.”_

_He looks back to the image of the cluster and sees impurities and wrongly imagined parts. It’s not home, just a copy and a sudden thought strikes him about why she would be showing him a fake copy of his home- “Why are you showing me this?”_

_The Doctor walks around him, like a leopard eyeing up prey. The hunted who became the hunter, or in her case, as he’s starting to realise. She was never prey; no one with a look that cold and empty could ever be prey. He was so wrong, should’ve just let the man go when she asked._

_He watches as the image fades, turning into nebulae and star systems he’s never seen before, changing rapidly and then turning to worlds and black holes. He watches as the universe flashes before his eyes, and if he had a heart, it would be hammering in his chest with want._

_“Take a good look at everything I’m showing you, remember it all.” She says, hand resting on his shoulder. “Because I’m going to take it all away, every single part of it, you’ll never see it again.”_

_He pulls away from her, eyes frantically looking around and spotting grey walls being built, the bricks slowly blocking out the view of space that he’s longed to rejoin. “What are you doing?”_

_“I’m locking you away-” She gestures around them both. “-these blocks will be your prison, you’ll never be able to escape, and no one will ever be able to pick you up again.” The Doctor steps back. “You’ll never be able to hurt anyone ever again-” She flicks her eyes to the image of her Fam, watching as they fade from view as well. “You’ll never be able to hurt Graham again.”_

_He turns his eyes back to the Doctor. He could beg and plead for her not to do this, appeal to the kindness that she tries to exude… but he won’t because he knows he wouldn’t listen in her place, and not after what he did to the older man. “We’re alike, Doctor.” He says again, instead._

_She turns to leave the room, the last blocks slowly filling up the empty spaces. Her eyes are sad as a small smile graces her features. “We are in ways, but I try to be good, try to make up for what I’ve done- try not to hurt, try to be kind. Always kind, and sometimes it slips but my friends, the ones you threatened and hurt, they’re there to ground me-” Her eyes change from sad and into a reflection of his own. “But they aren’t here now; they aren't here to watch me be cruel.”_

_She steps out of the room entirely as he watches the last blocks fill in the gap. There’s no sound, nothing but emptiness and the grey blocks surrounding him. He closes his eyes, the urge to scream and rage strong but pointless. He’s lost, and he’s paid the price in full. He thought being locked in a tiara, stuck with only seeing his surroundings was tortuous- this is worse because he feels nothing, no light, no heat- just a blank slate of canvas for eternity to stare at. He went against a Timeless god and lost._

 

The Doctor pulls her mind free, slowly and then quickly when she feels a hand holding onto her shoulder and shaking.

“Come on, Doctor, I need you!” Ryan demands, panic filling his voice. “Please!”

She opens her eyes and stares in the fear-stricken ones of Ryan. “I’m here-” She says, blinking for a moment. “What happened?”

Ryan breath comes in short gasps. “You just put that-” He eyes it, not feeling the pull at all that Yaz mentioned earlier. “Is it gone?”

The Doctor nods, hands moving up and taking it off. “It’s locked away-” She looks down at it before placing it in the inside pocket of her jacket. “I’m going to place it within the TARDIS; she’ll keep it secure. How long was I away?”

"Not long at all, Not-Graham dropped me and then collapsed on the floor as soon as you put that on," Ryan explains before getting back to the topic at hand and gesturing behind himself, his chest rapidly moving. “They aren’t waking up, I thought they-” Her eyes widen, and she scrambles to her feet, eyes darting between the still forms of Yaz and Graham. “I didn’t know if I should’ve moved Yaz cause she has a head injury, nan said something about not moving them-” He flicks his eyes to Graham. “-but he’s bleeding. Not by much, but he’s pale and cold.. and I- I can’t lose him, Doctor, I can’t lose someone else I love!”

“And you’re not going to, but I need you to focus, and I know it’s hard.” She commands, reaching over and taking his sweaty hands in hers. “Can you focus on me? Ryan, I’m going to need you to be brave,” She knows he is but he’s close to having a panic attack and she needs him. “Can you do that?”

Ryan calms his breathing and closes his eyes before giving her a swift nod. “I can.”

“Great, good work, Ryan.” She stands, looking over the two… the TARDIS still can’t be summoned, and she can’t risk moving Yaz without knowing the injuries she might have inside. “Ryan I need you to run to the village, explain that we’ve defeated the creature that lived here and that it’s safe- tell them to prop the door open if they’re unsure, but we need them because we have two very injured people, alright?”

“I can do that,” Ryan says, turning and rushing towards the door. “What about you?”

“I’m going to stabilise them both,” She explains and removes her eyes from Yaz and Graham. “Go, Ryan, time is of the essence now.” He gives her another swift nod, and she hears quick feet moving up the stairs.

She wastes no time in setting to work, brain going over everything she could possibly need... boards, neckbrace for Yaz, bandages for Graham, her mind tries to bring up what blood type Graham... she's pretty sure he's A-Positive, handy to have samples of all her companions even if they complain when she takes them. Oh, she’ll hold this over him- If he- no, he’ll live, they both will. She’ll damn well make sure of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to put the first bit that started in the now Chapter Eleven here but it didn't flow right.
> 
> No idea what blood type Graham could be so made him A-Positive because he's a positive bloke. *ba dum tish* I'll get my things...


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We have a guest appearance of someone! And a slight time skip of a few hours.
> 
> And a trigger warning: There are questions about self-inflicted wounds by the guest and mention of scars, and anxiety about them.

Ryan paces across the floor outside of the door that leads to one of the many wards on Resus One, mind wrought with anxiety. He turns to the Doctor again, who looks equally worried.

“Why is it taking them so long, it wasn’t this long the last time we were here.”

The Doctor bows her head, eyes focused on the floor and hearts thumping in her chest. She should be in there, but they kicked her out and said she needs rest. How could she rest when two of her friends are currently injured?

“We were only nicked by the sonic mine before, Ryan, this is-” She breathes out and raises her head to look at Ryan. “-my fault.”

Ryan frowns instantly at her. “What?”

“What Not-Graham said in there before we knew Graham was taken over-” She looks away and towards the doors. “-How this is just like me to take us places without thought.”

“Are you really going to do that, Doctor?” Ryan says with an edge to his voice. “Sit there and blame yourself while Yaz and my grandad are currently being treated for something that wasn’t your fault?” 

The Doctor goes to open her mouth, stopping when nothing comes to her because Ryan is right. She’s sat here blaming herself while they’re in there- Not fighting for their lives, thankfully. Yaz needs rest and plenty of it. Graham, unfortunately, requires a lot more than that and she hasn’t been able to even check on his mental state considering he hasn’t so much as stirred.

Ryan comes and sits next to her, his hand reaching out and taking hers. “You know he only said that to get to you, right? Cause the bastard did it to Yaz and to me, he was good at hitting our-”

“Insecurities?” The Doctor suggests as Ryan nods. “He was, but he can’t do that now, and even if he figures out how to escape from his prison he’ll have the TARDIS to go up against, and she doesn’t like creatures trying to invade her.”

Ryan looks slightly puzzled before sighing and looking back to the doors. “When do you think they’ll let us see them?”

The Doctor leans her head against the wall. “I don’t know, but if they had their way and if we weren’t stubborn then we would find ourselves in our own beds,” Ryan smirks at that, and she squeezes his hand in response. “Graham and Yaz will be fine; they’re in the care of Mabli and her team now.”

“Never thought we would see Mabli again,” Ryan looks to the Doctor. “She looked surprised to see that we haven’t aged, how long did you say since she last saw us?”

“I didn’t, and I never got the chance to check, but if I-” She licks her finger and places it in the air, face scrunching in thought. “-probably a good twenty or so years later for her,” She smiles. “She’s done well for herself, in charge of her own department on Resus One.”

“She has, hasn’t she? I wonder what Yoss and baby Avocado are doing-” Ryan says, trailing off when he sees movement approaching through the windows of the doors. He stands and heads forward, stopping when Mabli exits them.

“Ryan, Doctor-” She smiles, her now lined face filled with warmth. “It’s good to see you again, but I wish it would’ve been for a pop in to say hello, not this-” She looks at them both. “-would you come with me please, I have-”

Ryan’s eyes widen, and he steps forward. “Is my grandad okay?”

Mabli looks back over to Ryan. “Your grandad is going to be fine, he’s taken to the blood replenishment medicine well, and his wounds are healing,” She looks back at the Doctor again. “But the wounds, they’re what I want to ask about, and we should do it in my office.”

The Doctor flicks her eyes between Ryan and Mabli before nodding and gesturing for Mabli to lead the way. It’s not long until she’s lead them into a decently sized office overlooking the foyer where the Doctor can’t help but notice the little shop, still going strong since their last visit.

“Please take a seat,” Mabli says, drawing the Doctor’s attention back to her.

She gives Ryan a nod, and they both take a seat at the same time as Mabli takes the one at her desk. “You wanted to ask us about Graham’s wounds.”

Mabli steeples her hands in front of her. “I want you to know before I ask that with situations like these we need to make sure that-”

“What do you want to ask Mabli?” The Doctor interjects, wanting to get to the meat of the subject quickly.

Mabli sighs and stares at them. “Did he do them to himself?”

Ryan frowns and glares at Mabli for daring to ask such a question. “No, he bloody well-”

“Ryan,” Mabli’s voice cuts in, shutting him up. “They’re self-inflicted, we can tell that and what’s more concerning are the bruises on Yaz’ neck, they match his-”

Ryan’s face turns from a frown to outright anger which the Doctor spots. She reaches over and places a hand on his arm, causing him to glance at her. “Ryan, she’s doing her job.”

“She thinks that my grandad strangled Yaz and then did that to himself, that’s what she wants to ask us.” He stares back at Mabli. “He didn’t do it.”

Mabli looks over to the Doctor, eyes asking for her to confirm it. The Doctor sighs, her hand reaching in and taking out the tiara. “It’s a lot to understand but suffice to say, this tiara did it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Graham was taken over by it; it held a creature from the Jeggorabax-”

“Jeggorabax? Why would you be in contact with something from that dark nebula?”

The Doctor looks puzzled now. “You know of it?”

Mabli nods and smiles sadly. “When the Pting attacked the Tsuranga, and after it all settled back down here, I took time to learn about the different places in the galaxy, where to go and where not to go. That was one of them that I put on the ‘not to go’ list.”

“Wise move, Mabli.”

“So you came into contact with it, but how did a tiara take control of Graham?” Mabli asks, not doubting them for one second. If someone saves you from a Pting, you tend to believe them and follow them when they talk.

“It’s old, Mabli, very old and it had years to practice getting into human brains-” She picks it back up again and places it back within her coat. “-it’s safe now though, can’t ever hurt anyone else again.”

Ryan takes his eyes from the Doctor and locks them on Mabli again. “The creature attacked us by using my grandad’s body-” He looks away, hand rubbing at his tired eyes. “He did something that angered it and it-” Ryan’s voice breaks, his memory of his grandad’s tortured screams fresh in his mind.

The Doctor moves her hand from his arm and retakes his hand before turning to look at Mabli. “It caused those injuries to him while he was awake.”

Mabli eyes widen, and the Doctor hears a colourful swear under her breath, one that Ryan wouldn’t understand or be able to pick up on. “He’s free of the creature now?” The Doctor nods. “That’s good,” She sighs and flicks her gaze to Ryan. “Hopefully he’ll be waking within the next few days, but his body was exhausted, and I’m reluctant to let people see him when he does-” She catches Ryan about to speak and raises a hand. “-but I remember the last time I treated you four, there’s no stopping you when you all set your mind on something.”

“So you’ll let us see him?”

“I will, but when I ask for you to leave, you leave? That’s the condition.”

Ryan nods, accepting the condition. “What about Yaz?”

“She’s sleeping, she took a bad knock to her head, and we’ve placed some mild sedatives into her system. That’s the best treatment for her at this moment in time; she can see him when I say she’s allowed to move around.” Her face then turns concerned, when she sees the exhaustion on Ryan and the Doctor. “You all need rest and Graham is unlikely to awaken tonight.”

“I would like to-”

The Doctor squeezes Ryan’s hand again. “Probably should do what she says, Ryan-”

“And that means you as well, Doctor!” Mabli reaffirms, making the Doctor frown at her. “-No fighting me on this.”

“I’m fine-”

“Doctor, you and Ryan will be getting checked out, no arguments.” She says, voice commanding. “Now come on, we’ve got two beds with your names on them.”

The Doctor scowls after Mabli while Ryan rolls his eyes before a yawn hits him. “Come on, Doctor, let’s listen to the actual doctor for once.”

“I’ll have you know that I have a medical license Ryan-” She shrugs slightly. “-of course, it might be a few centuries out of date, but I did pass the exam.”

“Then you will know all about patients getting rest when they’ve been through an ordeal, Doctor.”

The Doctor scowls back at Mabli again, muttering under her breath about know-it-all doctors.

* * *

 

The first thing Yaz feels when she wakes is a splitting headache as she squints her eyes open, eyes darting around the room and spotting the Doctor, passed out in a chair and Ryan lying face down on a bench that has clearly been dragged into the room judging by the scuff marks on the floor.

She frowns, the motion causing her head to throb and she can’t help the wince that escapes her throat, the smallest of sounds causing the Doctor to snap awake — her motions making Ryan startle as well.

“YAZ!” The Doctor says as Yaz screws her eyes shut.

“Little bit-” Her throat is dry. “-quieter please, Doctor.”

The Doctor scrunches her face but comes forward, Ryan following after rubbing at his eyes. “Sorry.”

Yaz smiles weakly, eyes looking over to the cup on her bedside table. The Doctor spots where she’s looking and reaches over, bringing the cup and curious looking straw to Yaz’ mouth. She drinks eagerly, throat feeling infinitely better as she leans back onto the pillow.

She moves her eyes across the room again. “Where’s-” She feels her heartbeat with worry. “Where is Graham?”

“He’s in his own room like you are, but he’s alright, he’ll be fine.” The Doctor reassures. “His injuries were a bit more serious than yours, and he lost a decent amount of blood.”

Yaz looks over to Ryan, seeing the worry lines creased into his forehead. “Has he woken up? Have you seen him?”

“Mabli says we just got to give him time,” Ryan says with a frustrated tone. “But he’s been out for a few days now-”

“A few days?!” ask Yaz, her eyes wide, and she blinks them trying to escape from the hospital lights. She frowns suddenly. “Wait, you said Mabli? We’re on Tsuranga?”

“Resus One to be precise, Yaz, it was the first place I thought of that could treat you two quickly, and that wouldn’t ask or follow up if I took you back to Earth to been seen to.”

“Didn’t stop Mabli from insinuating that my grandad was a sociopath though-” mutters Ryan.

Yaz decides to leave that alone for the time being and faces the Doctor instead. “Did you stop it? The tiara?”

The Doctor nods. “I locked it away where it can’t be found and where it can’t hurt anyone again. Only me and the TARDIS know where it is, and it stays that way.”

“That’s good,” She purses her lips, thoughts drifting to Graham. “I need to see him, tell him that I don’t fear his face like the creature said because he wasn’t the one who had my throat-” She brings a hand up and rubs at the sore flesh. “-I mean it was his hands, but it wasn’t him- His face, although the same wasn’t the kind man that I consider family.”

Ryan moves his hand over to hers and takes it gently. “He grabbed me as well, mate, I know what you feel.”

Yaz looks over to him, nodding while the Doctor watches her two younger human friends. “Khan and Sinclair, the best humanity has to offer.” She says with kindness as they look back at her.

They’re shared moment gets broken apart when the door opens, revealing Mabli, and they look up to her. “He’s awake.”

Ryan turns and pauses, eyes darting to Yaz, and she rolls her eyes at him. “Go you fool, he’s your grandad, and he currently has no one there with him.” She looks to the Doctor who seems torn as well. “You as well Doctor, I’m fine here.”

Ryan wastes no time in exiting the room whereas the Doctor pauses as Yaz pushes her on. “Go and give him my well wishes, Doctor.”

The Doctor nods and rushes after Ryan, leaving a bemused Mabli stood to the side. She looks back at Yaz. “They’ve been hovering around from room to room, I kick them from one, and then I find them in the other.”

Yaz smiles, wishing herself that she could go and see Graham but, quite frankly, she feels the pull of sleep on her soul again, and before long she’s drifted off again, this time on her own terms.

* * *

 

Graham wakes to the sound of an annoying beep, and then a clinical smell hitting his nose, one that he hates and one that instantly tells him where he is.

A hospital. 

He’s had enough of the bloody things. He slowly opens his eyes, realising he’s been placed on a bed at an incline when he stares at the wall ahead of him. Closing his eyes again, the brightness of the room stinging them leaves him able to finally feel his aching body.

Limbs heavy, and uncomfortable, chest sore and a headache to end all headaches.

But none of that matters when he opens his eyes again, hoping to see Ryan, the Doc, or- He pauses, mouth clenched shut when he remembers.

He threw Yaz into a wall. She could be dead for all he knows, and then he grabbed Ryan- It makes sense that they aren’t here then, probably can’t bear to be in the same room as him. He knows it wasn’t him, and he’s sure they do as well but… if they wanted to see him, they would be here, wouldn’t they?

Graham breathes out, eyes lowered to himself and looking over the bandages and then the IV connected up to him, pumping in something that he doesn’t have a chance in hell to understand. Which makes him wonder if he’s even on Earth? He frowns, needing to know.

He flicks his eyes to the door. They’ll probably tell him off, but he needs to see, so he removes a bandage on his right arm. Left hand shaking from the effort but he succeeds, spotting the partially healed wound that the creature made, too fast for a human body to heal and Earth definitely doesn’t have medicine like this. So that answers his question then.

He’s not on Earth, which means the Doc took him here so maybe she’s just busy at the moment, but that doesn’t explain why Ryan isn’t here but if Yaz is dea- He wouldn’t blame the lad. He looks down at the cut again, and he knows it and the others are going to scar — a constant reminder of something he never wants to think about again.

The beeping of the machine increases, and he knows he’s breathing hard with panic and fear. A sick feeling growing within as his shame raises. The creature did the one thing he didn’t want it to do, hurt his friends and family with his own hands, and as he stares at them, he can visualise the blood on them.

The door to his room opens, and he turns away from it, not wanting to see the person entering. He wants to be-

“Graham, it’s alright, you’re safe.” says a voice he vaguely recognises but he doesn't turn to look at her as he feels a hand on his right arm. “Why did you take your bandage off?” The statement sounds puzzled, and he shrugs at her, not wanting to speak. He feels her lift his arm again, replacing the bandage and then moving around and into his line of sight. “Graham, you’re safe here.”

He looks to her, recognising her older face. “Mabli?” He says, voice completely hoarse and raw. He watches as she reaches over and holds out a cup for him to drink from which he reluctantly does because he’s sure she’s not going to remove it until he does.

“It’s a liquid to increase healing; your larynx was bruised-”

“Yaz.” He interjects, not caring to know about himself. “Is she dead?”

Mabli face softens. “She’s fine, resting like you are.” He nods. “The Doctor and Ryan will be happy that you’re awake.”

“What?” Graham looks up at her, focusing on her face and sees a kind smile reflected back at him. One he doesn’t deserve.

“They’ve been swapping between your room and Yaz’,” Mabli answers. “I kicked them from yours a few hours ago because we needed to change your bandages.”

“They were here?” Graham asks, incredulous. “I thought-” They were here, he thinks suddenly. He was wrong, and isn’t that a relief… “I need to see them.” He says, sitting up and groaning in pain but he needs to see them, needs to apologise and presses on.

“Whoa!” Mabli’s hands are on his chest quickly. “No, Graham, what you need to do is stay in this bed until you’re better.” Her tone is exasperated. “You four are, by far, the worst patients I have ever had to deal with.”

“They need to-”

“No, Graham, you need to _rest_.” Mabli commands. “I will go and inform the Doctor and Ryan that you have woken up. I’m sure they’ll be along as soon as the words leave my mouth.”

Graham finally relents, allowing Mabli to place him gently back down and she goes to turn, but he reaches out and takes her hand. “I- I have one question before you get them, a personal one.”

Mabli stops and faces Graham again, as he chews the inside of his mouth, his eyes flicking down to his arm. “Can you fix them?”

Mabli catches where he’s looking. “The scars?” Graham gives a slight nod of his head. “We have creams that can diminish them, but they won’t remove them from you, Graham, I’m sorry.”

Graham turns his head from his arm again and focuses back onto the clinical white wall instead. “Worth asking, I spose.” Mabli gives a light squeeze of his hand that he doesn’t return and he hears her move from the room.

So that’s that then, whenever he looks at himself in the mirror or wears something short sleeved, he’s to be reminded. Graham closes his eyes, willing the growing wetness in them to disappear before the Doc or Ryan arrived, he can’t deal with them, asking questions that he doesn’t want to answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually going to be longer than I thought.
> 
> Because that isn't something that people get over quickly.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the delay in an upload, I had some IRL stuff to deal with which wasn't fun and I sorta lost my focus on writing for a few days.

The sound of the door opening draws Graham’s attention to it just as Ryan enters, swiftly followed by the Doctor. There’s a moment when no one speaks, and Graham feels the pressure of being watched, and he looks away first, eyes focused on his lap. “Mabli told me that you've-” He pauses, voice still hoarse and rough. “-been waiting for me to wake up.”

“Yeah, you took your time, gramps,” Ryan says as he walks into the room.

"How long was I out for?"

"A few days now, you really worried us,” Ryan reveals as he reaches out a hand to Graham and slowly holds onto his hand, breathing out a sigh of relief when he doesn’t pull away, but he glances to the Doctor, eyes now uncertain at how to proceed.

The Doctor walks forward, and Graham watches her as she approaches him on the opposite side to Ryan. “How are you feeling?”

Graham continues to stare into his lap, eyes flicking around the different details, from threads to marks. Just anything to keep his mind distracted and busy. “Honestly?” Graham eventually says, leaving the air clear when his throat aches. “I could be better, I need to-” He closes his eyes and takes in a deep breath. "I hate hospitals." He says instead. "Had enough of the horrid things back in Sheffield cause it's the smell that gets to you first, sticks in the back of your throat."

"You hate hospitals?" The Doctor wonders. "I like the little shop they have, should always have a little shop, did you know that the one on Resus One is still going strong, Graham?"

"How could I know that, Doc? I've only just woken up, haven't I?" Graham responds, not meaning the tight tone in his voice. "-and I don't much care for them anyway, all overpriced."

After a moment of Ryan and the Doctor sharing concerned glances with each other, Graham looks up at them, wondering why they're suddenly silent. His eyes catch the exhaustion on Ryan’s and the Doc’s faces, and then they land Ryan’s bruised neck.

There’s a sick feeling building in him as he raises his currently free hand up, locking his eyes on that instead and remembering when that creature had it around his grandson’s neck. The traitorous beeping of the machine connected to him starts up again, warning everyone within the room of his increased heart rate.

The Doctor places a gentle hand on his arm and keeps it there even after he flinches, eyes going wide for a brief moment. “Graham, hey, it’s okay; you’re safe here.”

Graham shakes his head, and he pulls his hand free from Ryan, burying them from view as he stares uncomfortably at Ryan’s neck. “I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry, Ryan... my hands were around yours and Yaz'-"

Ryan looks puzzled for a second, brows furrowing in thought as his tired brain finally connects the dots at what Graham is looking at, and he feels stupid, so bloody stupid. Of course he would spot them; he should've covered them up. “You didn’t do it-”

Graham snorts as he removes his eyes from Ryan. “I did, though, didn’t I?” He stares down at his hated hands. “Not literally, I know that, but these-” He gestures with them. “-they did it… while I watched, uselessly.”

The Doctor watches him; concern plastered across her face as she lightly squeezes his shoulder. “Graham, you didn’t watch uselessly, you fought back and stalled him when he-”

“After he threw Yaz into the bleeding wall, Doc,” Graham interrupts, abruptly while staring at the Doctor. “After it-” He glances at Ryan. “-after it did what it did to… I was useless because I couldn’t stop it until it hurt you all and it did it with my own hands, it did the one thing I never wanted it to do to the people I love.”

“What do you remember, Graham?”

Graham removes his eyes from the Doctor’s face and stares ahead at the wall. “Would it help if I lie about it and say nothing? That I don't remember anything?” He sighs and leans back against his pillows. “I remember every single thing, Doc, everything it made me do-” He brings a hand up and rests it against his tired eyes. “It’s there right in my memories.”

“What-” Ryan starts, cutting himself off and sucking in a deep breath in preparation for what he needs to ask. “What did it… do to you? You know... after you told us about the cellar.”

“No offence, son, but you don’t want to know, and it’s not something I’m ever going to tell you.”

Ryan nods fruitlessly, knowing Graham can’t see it with his eyes closed. “That’s fair enough, gramps.”

There’s an awkward moment of silence as no one knows where to look lest they catch the others gaze. Graham breathes out and looks back at the Doctor. “What did you do to it by the way? Cause I felt it when it was pulled from my head, the coldness stopped and then-” He shrugs, the motion pulling on the bandages across his chest. “I woke up here.”

“I sealed it away, Graham, it can’t harm-”

“Wait stop, Doc, you didn’t destroy it?” Graham interjects with an edge to his voice as his face frowns and eyes narrow. “Why wouldn’t you just destroy it? End it so it couldn’t hurt anyone else ever again?” He asks, hands moving with the motion of the question. "What use is it? Cause it ain't special and I don't give a crap if it's unique, it should be destroyed."

“I locked it away.”

“Where?”

“In the TARDIS-”

“Oh, in the TARDIS cause that makes total sense, Doctor, lock a creature that can take over a house in a ship that travels in bleeding time, oh brilliant idea! Let it have access to all of time and-”

“Grandad!” Ryan calls out over Graham. “What are you doing?”

Graham snaps his eyes to Ryan. “Questioning why the Doctor wouldn’t just kill it, Ryan!” He turns back to her. “It’s evil and twisted, and it deserves to die for what it did and-” He breathes hard, the annoyance from the machine beeping away in the background aggravating him. “-I’m not going to apologise for wanting to see it dead.”

“It’s safe in the TARDIS, Graham, it won’t be able to get out.” The Doctor explains. “I built a personal and bespoke prison for it; it has eternity to spend in there. You are safe, we all are because the TARDIS will lock it away for good, she'll take care of it.”

Graham feels a fit of anger below the surface, burning away at what it did to them and him and he can’t help that it’s starting to override his senses as he stares back at the Doctor. “I don’t bloody care that it can’t get out, I want it dead-” He says, words sharp and short. “-It tortured me… it doesn’t deserve-” He cuts himself off and stares down at his lap again. “Look, can you two just leave me alone for the time being?”

“Grandad, you just-”

“Ryan, I’m sorry but-” Graham says, now looking at his grandson. “-but I need to- I need time to think, that’s all, this is a lot to take in, and I need time to figure it all out.”

“Are you sure?” Graham nods for confirmation, the movement slight as his jaw clenches. “I’ll get you something to eat and drink then,” Ryan says, his hand laying a gentle pat on Graham’s shoulder. “But I’ll be back, okay?”

“Thanks, son, look-” Graham starts as a hand that he tries his best to avoid looking at reaches out and takes Ryan’s. “ I- I need time to sort it out, and I’ve only just woken up.”

Ryan nods and squeezes Graham’s hand before letting it go and turning to leave the room, pausing only to look back at the Doctor. “Are you coming as well?”

“I’ll be along in one minute, Ryan.” The Doctor informs the younger man, who hesitates and only leaves when Graham waves him on.

“Doc,” Graham says as Ryan leaves, his eyes refusing to look at her. “What do you want to ask? Cause it’s clear you want to ask something.”

“What did it do to you, exactly?” The Doctor questions, tone gentle and encouraging. “You don’t have to tell me like you didn’t tell Ryan but-”

“It cut into my arms, Doctor, and when it got bored of doing that, it moved onto my chest, legs-” Graham explains, his hands clenching the fabric covering him. “Do you want me to continue?” The Doctor shakes her head. “That’s why I want it dead, Doc, not because of some quest for revenge like I had with that blue monster.” He looks away again, and he can’t help the wetness escaping his eyes. “It’s the fact that it’s still out there, even if it’s locked away somewhere, it’s enough to be a reminder.” _Like the scars_ , Graham doesn’t add as he continues to face away from her.

“It can never hurt you again, Graham, I will make sure of that.” The Doctor reassures as she watches his face. “At this moment in time, you and Yaz are my main concern." She watches his expression and sighs. "But, we’ll revisit this and that subject at another time, alright?”

Graham nods but doesn’t respond to her, and he waits for her to leave as Ryan did. The imprint from where she was touching him lingering as she exits the room, leaving him alone and to his thoughts.

He doesn’t sleep, couldn’t if he wanted to really, so he lies there with his eyes closed, counting the rhythmic beeps of the heart monitor. One, two, repeat… as his brain thinks the entire situation over.

It’s not that he doesn’t trust the Doctor and he does believe her when she told him that’s it’s locked away and can’t hurt anyone, but the fact that it’s alive and… still there. That’s what gets to him.

“Pull yourself together, Graham,” He speaks aloud and to the empty room. “Cause you can’t lose it at her again, but how can she not see that it’s safer in the long run? Cause killing it would mean that there isn’t a chance for it to come back if it does manage to escape somehow?”

Graham pauses and shakes his head. “And now you’re talking to yourself, Graham, truly you’ve lost your marbles now.”

_“Oh, I’m not so sure about that, Graham.” cuts in another’s voice, or more precisely his own. “Because you could talk to me.”_

Graham freezes, blood running cold as he snaps his eyes open and stares at himself lounging on the chair off to the side. He grins and waves back at Graham.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My bastard child is back.  
> Sorta.  
> One clue: Graham did what he's doing now in Arachnids in the UK.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oof
> 
> That's all I'm going to say about this chapter.

Graham stares at himself, heart thumping in his chest. “You’re not really here; you can’t be, the Doc said you were-.”

_He rolls his eyes and then stares intently back at Graham, eyes greyer and not Graham’s usual vibrant blue. “Gone? Maybe I’m not gone, and she lied,” He replies, cocking his head to the side as the heart rate machine increases its incessant beeping. “Or you’re imagining me like you imagined your dead wife-” He narrows his eyes.  “-you truly have issues, Graham, and ones you really should sort out. It's not healthy."_

“Oh, and I spose imagining my own version of ' _Mr Hyde'_ ' helps me overcome them, then?” Graham snaps, wondering if he’s completely lost it now. “Because talking to yourself is honestly the first sign of madness, they say.”

_“That’s up to you to decide, Graham.” He replies back. “Why did you imagine Grace? Was it because of the guilt that you lived while she died? Because if it was then, this makes sense, I suppose.” He finishes lazily, his foot tapping away as he lounges in the chair._

“Don’t do this to me.”

_“You’re doing it to yourself,” He explains while pointing a hand at Graham. “You feel guilt for what I did like you felt guilty for surviving cancer.”_

Graham glares at his double and in the back of his mind, he knows this is false. He envisioned Grace, his mother when she passed- It’s a coping mechanism he has. He just never thought he would picture himself, or the creature as himself mind you. 

But it’s not wrong though; he suspects he does have issues because imagining dead loved ones talking to you probably wasn’t the best course of action to take in regards to grief but at the time it helped him understand it in a way. This time, however, he’s not picturing a loved one- He’s picturing something he hates.

He continues to watch his double who’s content to just stare back with a knowing look plastered across his smug face as the thought finally sinks in. He’s picturing something he hates, and that person just so happens to have his damn _face_. If this is all internal... then that's going to make a therapist one wealthy person.

_“You’re not going to reply, Graham?”_

“You’re not here.”

_“Are you sure about that?” He replies, now standing up and sauntering over to Graham. “I’m inside you, might not be anymore, locked back into my prison but the presence is there, the memories are there inside you.” He leans in closer, and Graham knows it’s impossible, but he can almost feel the breath on his face. “And the marks on your friends are still there, caused by your hands, not to mention your own.”_

Graham clenches his hands, the inability to escape, to run, is panic inducing but he powers through. He remembers the coldness from before, and he doesn’t feel that now, just warmth from his skin... and that's good, warm is good... he's safe with warm. “You’re not here,” Graham repeats with certainty, and as he stares back to the envisioned creature towering over him, he releases the breath he was holding when it fades.

He leans back against the pillow, eyes locked onto the ceiling, and his thoughts drift away.

* * *

 

Mabli makes her way back to her office. Working on the ships, although stressful, it isn’t as stressful as running a department on Resus One and with her newest patients, life hasn't gotten easier.

The door swishes open when she presses her hand into the ID scanner, and she steps inside, eyes instantly zoning onto the person sitting in the chair opposite her own. “Doctor.” She says with a sigh. “I’m not even going to ask how you got into my office.”

“Probably best you don’t.” The Doctor answers as she stares out the window overlooking the shop. "It wasn't very secure."

Mabli hums and decides to let that slide as she comes around her desk and sits down on her chair, her body sagging slightly from exhaustion. “I thought you would’ve been with Graham by now.”

The Doctor looks back to Mabli, her eyes the only show on her face at the storm raging inside her. “He asked us to leave.” She says as she leans forward, hands pressed against her face. "It's all my fault."

Mabli watches her friend, and for the first time she sees a vulnerability to the apparent unaging woman, and it’s a surprise, to say the least. The Doctor and her friends went up against a Pting, saved her and the others, they lost two people, but she and her friends, without them, they would’ve all died. So this almost defeated figure leaning for support on her desk is shocking.

She reckons that the Doctor hardly senses her presence here as well, and she knows in her heart that the only reason the Doctor is actually hidden away in her office is that it’s the quietest place on Resus One.

“Doctor,” The woman in question grunts in response, her eyes still closed and hands pressed against her face. “Why are you here?”

The Doctor after a moment finally opens her eyes and Mabli feels the pressure of ancient eyes staring at her. “I had a duty of care, and I failed.” _Again_...

“What do you mean?”

“To them, Mabli,” She replies, her mind drifting to Bill and Nardole... and Missy, in a way, her most recent failings and then it lands on her Fam, her current. "Always _them_."

“Your friends?” 

The Doctor nods, the move subtle and almost unnoticeable, and she returns her gaze to the shop again, watching people buying items at an extortionate price. 

Like Graham paid for her lack of forethought, along with Yaz and Ryan... if she just left the signal well alone and they went somewhere else, if she only managed to keep her curiosity in check for once, then none of this would've happened, regardless of what Ryan said.

She warned them this time, unlike all the others before, and she wasn’t wrong when she said they would come back different, but she just never expected one of them to come back with the reminders spread across his body in the form of scars.

She looks back to Mabli. “I warned them and I didn’t glorify travelling with me this time, told them they would be changed and they agreed, and it was meant to be different this time-” Her eyes narrow as her hands pressed into her temples. “-but I slipped back into my old habits just as quickly.” The Doctor rambles, as Mabli frowns at her. “Danger follows me.”

“Danger follows everyone, Doctor.”

The Doctor shakes her head. “Graham wouldn’t have gotten taken over if I refused their request to travel with me in the beginning.” _If I refused their offer of friendship if I just left-_

Mabli leans back her chair and stares long and hard at the woman in front of her. “And I would be dead without you and them, Doctor.” She continues to stare at the Doctor. “They knew the risks.”

“Did they? I warned them but I never explained what happened before I met-” The Doctor cuts herself off, Mabli doesn’t need to hear of the countless people she’s lost over her long and lonely life. “They already lost someone after I fell into their lives, a brilliant woman by the name of Grace. Ryan's nan and Graham's wife. If I didn’t meet them, then-” She pauses again, thinking the situation over, and it hits her. “-then they would all be dead.”

Mabli raises an eyebrow at that. “Dead?”

“DNA bombs were planted into them and me.” The Doctor says as Mabli face pales. “But I got them out, saved them.”

“They are lucky to be alive then.” Mabli points out to her. “DNA bombs are outlawed and a horrible way to die.”

The Doctor nods and glances around the room, eventually landing her eyes back onto Mabli. “How long until they can be moved from your care?”

“I shouldn’t tell you, Doctor, patient confidentiality and everything, but… you’re a family of sorts, that much I can see.” sighs Mabli as she reaches over to a futuristic tablet and pulls up the files of Yaz and Graham, her eyes quickly reading them with practised ease. She looks back to the Doctor and smiles kindly. “Yaz is sleeping again, and thankfully on her own free will this time. She will be able to move around by the next time she wakes up, and I’m happy for her to do that, but she must take light activities.” Mabli explains.

“And Graham?”

Mabli glances back at his file again before focusing back onto the Doctor. “Physically he’ll be able to walk around and do light activities like Yaz; his wounds are healing-”

“But?” There's always a but.

“He was tortured, Doctor,” Mabli says, voice tight and professional. “His wounds will heal but his mental health, I’m not sure- I’m not that kind of doctor but what I know is that no one will come back the same after something traumatic like that.”

The Doctor nods, but she doesn’t reply. She doesn’t need Mabli to tell her what she already knows. “Thank you, Mabli, for everything, but as soon as they can leave, we’ll be going.” She says, standing up in one swift motion and turning to exit without saying anything else.

* * *

 

Ryan carefully makes his way back to his grandad's room, the tray of food held within his hands focused on. The last thing he wants to do is drop it and get another from the canteen, not after having them glare at him as he fumbled around for a while trying to figure out what Graham would even like.

His thoughts go back to his grandad, and he feels a pit of worry open up inside him. It hurt when the man asked for him and the Doctor to leave, and it hurt when he wouldn’t tell him what that creature did to him.

But he can’t blame his grandad. If he were in his situation, he wouldn’t tell him what happened either. He pauses by a desk and gently places the tray down as he fumbles his jacket, his distracted mind making the task a lot harder than it usually is, but he succeeds and arranges his collar to cover most of the bruising up.

Picking up his tray again, he proceeds onwards and comes up to his grandad's familiar door. Using his foot, Ryan gently kicks the door open and spots the older man looking up at the ceiling and making no effort to register that he’s just entered again.

“Got you something to-”

Graham jumps, hands grabbing onto the side of the bed as his wild eyes stare at Ryan, and his chest rapidly rises and falls with panicked breaths. He frowns and it's not long before his defensive stance relaxes somewhat, allowing him to lie back down onto the bed. “Sorry ‘bout that, Ryan was miles away.” He mumbles, eyes darting away and towards a chair. He breathes out when the image he made isn’t there. “Had a lot to think about,” Graham says, now looking back at Ryan.

“Yeah, you probably did,” Ryan replies with a small smile, something to offer comfort he hopes as he comes forward with the tray, placing it on the bedside table. “How are you? Just between us, though, you can tell me the truth.”

Graham shrugs in response, face wincing when the motion pulls on his injuries. “I’m, you know-” He hesitates on the answer as his flick to the tray of food when the smell hits him. _That’s an easy distraction from the topic in hand_ he thinks quickly. 

“What have you got, son?” It’s hospital food, and that’s usually crap, but judging by the sudden hunger pang in his stomach, anything would smell great right about now even if he doesn’t really want to eat. “I’m hank marving.”

Ryan glances to it. “I dunno, stuff that I liked, didn’t want to risk it by getting anything else in case it wasn’t okay for humans.” He answers while picking something strange off it and holding it out to Graham, urging him to take it. “They don’t actually know I brought this to you, by the way, but I figured you probably wanted something sweet to eat.” Ryan looks up at the IV connected to Graham. “Whatever that is in there, they said that it would give you the stuff you need, but food helps, don't it? You always bring up when we don't stop for food,” says Ryan as he tries to alleviate the mood.

Graham accepts the weirdly coloured… fruit, if he had to guess what it was, from Ryan and holds onto it awkwardly. “Have you seen Yaz again..? You know, since before I woke up.”

Ryan shakes his head and Graham watches as he takes the same piece of food off just to see how he attempts to eat it. “I went back there, but she was asleep again-” Ryan answers as his hands start peeling away at the fruit, but he notices the lack of enthusiasm for the food from his grandad. “-didn’t want to wake her, so I went to the canteen and came back here.”

“What about the Doctor?” Graham asks while his hands pick at the fruit.

“Not sure.”

_“Well, this is truly an awkward conversation, Graham.”_

Graham’s hands pause, and he looks up, this time spotting the image of himself leaning against the wall. It’s wearing what he had on in the house he realises. He glances at Ryan and then back to it again when the lad shows no reaction to it.

_“You don’t have to reply to me,” He says. “And it’s not like the boy can see me because I only exist in here-” He points to his head. “Although you could talk to me, nothing stopping you from talking out loud now. It might concern the boy, though.”_

Graham ignores the specter and focuses on Ryan instead. He spots that the lad has done his jacket up now and the guilt at what they did builds within him. He looks away from Ryan and then himself. “I want to go back to Sheffield,” Graham says in a muffled tone. He gives up on the idea of food completely.

“For good?” Ryan asks with worry, he never once thought that his grandad would stop. Obviously they would at some point, but he thought it would be a while away at least.

Graham shrugs again. “No… maybe, I don’t know-” He looks into the eyes of himself. “I need time to myself.”

_The conjured image grins at Graham. "Never knew you cared about me like that, love."_

“Oh,” Ryan says, and the hurt within him is back again. “I can go-” He says as he starts to get up.

Graham looks back to Ryan, his hand edging out to the lad but stopping and pulling back. “No, I didn’t mean like that, son, I just- There’s a lot to sort out.”

Ryan nods and settles back down into the chair, but he feels the lump growing in his throat. “I should’ve realised it wasn’t you, grandad.”

“What?”

“I should’ve noticed something was up- If I did, then maybe the Doctor could’ve solved this quicker, and you wouldn’t have gotten tortu- _hurt_.” He can’t help but let his mouth run with what he’s feeling, the entire stress of everything coming forward instantly. “I’m sorry for not noticing.”

Graham, for the first time, leans fully forward and faces Ryan. He reaches out, tentatively and carefully. Almost like he’s terrified that his hands will hurt his grandson again as they hold onto him and pull him into a hug. “Never ever think this was your fault, son-”

_“Oh, I’ve had in him my arms as well, Graham.”_

Graham takes in a shaky breath, and the urge to let go of Ryan is so powerful, and he very nearly does, only stopping when Ryan’s arms wrap around him and Graham feels the shuddering in his grandson's body. He’s… crying, wait, he never _cries_.

“Oh, Ryan.” Graham breathes out and pulls him closer as his eyes flick to the disappearing ghost and he feels the wetness on his face, so now they're both crying. “This wasn’t your fault-” Graham says, his voice wobbling with emotion. “-the fault lies with that creature. I don’t blame any of you for not spotting it-”

“But if I-”

“If you what, son?” Graham interrupts as Ryan clings to his back, the tightness of their hug hurting the partially healed wounds but he won’t mention that at all. “It was the perfect mimic, it knew everything I knew and so it knew how I acted. I don’t want you ever thinkin' you should’ve spotted it, son, cause if the Doc couldn't help at first, then you and Yaz had no chance. It had years worth of practice at copying people.”

Ryan nods and he feels daft, but his nan never told him to hide or bottle his emotions up and so he releases them as he clings to his grandad. “Then I don’t want you thinking that you hurt me, grandad.” He says, pulling away and looking into the tired blue eyes of his grandad. “And I know Yaz will think the same.”

Graham nods, and he will take it to heart, or at least try to take it to heart, but what he- no, _they_ did together. That’s not something he can forgive so easily. “I think it’s ‘bout time I saw her-

"What?"

Graham pulls the cover off him, and he spots that someone at some point has dressed him in scrubs... great. He looks to Ryan again. "Help me up, son, I'm seeing her now, regardless of what anyone says.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're going to Yaz next but the poor woman needed sleep.  
> Head injuries suck.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update but I was occupied with my holiday preparation stuff because I'm currently in Cornwall now.  
> I have my chromebook with me though and can write in the evenings.
> 
> The same applies to Family Ties, my more 'fluffy' fic because this is quite angsty.

“Grandad, I really don’t think you should be doing this,” Ryan says again with concern. “And you shouldn’t have taken out that IV thing-”

“I’m fine, son, perfectly fine, and I watched your nan disconnect stuff like that all the time back when I went through chemo-"

“Yeah, but this isn’t that, gramps, this is something from the future. What if you did it wrong? You weren't trained like Nan was, or how Mebli is, we should head back and wait until they say you can walk around-”

“How difficult could it be? I’m fine-” Graham grunts out with his hand gripped around himself, clearly not fine. “Well, I hope anyway, but it’s all the same right? I’m not bleeding-” He’s bled enough recently, Graham muses quickly, and for once, he’s glad of the bandages and scrubs for covering the scars. “Come on.”

Ryan stares back at him, and he takes a deep breath. “Mabli will kill me if she finds that I didn’t stop you.”

“She won’t, and you can just tell her that I was gonna do it either with you there or not and that there was no stopping me,” Graham answers back and continues on with Ryan. He stares ahead and avoids Ryan’s gaze because the lad isn’t wrong, he knows he shouldn’t be taking out futuristic IVs and that there probably will be hell to pay for it, but he really doesn’t care right about now, and mostly? He really doesn’t care about himself now, he's not important. “-just keep your voice down, we’re lucky that we haven’t bumped into anyone... is it much further?”

Ryan shakes his head, but he’s not happy with this at all. He gestures to a door a bit further down. “It’s that one.”

“Right,” Graham says, and he picks up speed, his feet trying to move silently across the cold, stark floor, wait _cold_ … he can’t help the sudden intake of breath and the increased heart rate at the cool feeling against his feet. No, it’s not- It’s not him, it’s just the floor. All floors are cold, aren’t they? Warm is better; they should be warm-

“Gramps?”

Ryan’s voice breaks into his silent monologue, and Graham shakes his head, eyes snapping to his grandson. “What?”

“You just stopped and stared at your feet,” Ryan reveals, and he comes forward. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, just-” Graham darts his eyes around. “Just thinking ’bout something was all.”

Ryan watches as Graham turns and walks, or better put in his opinion, limps to Yaz’s door and he knows they shouldn’t be doing this. He follows after him and notices that the older man only has eyes for what’s in front of him. Something is definitely bothering him, but whether he’ll tell him or not is another thing altogether, and he knows the older man won’t. Not to him anyway and probably not to Yaz either. Maybe to the Doctor though, and that thought hurts. He just wants to be there for his grandad, can he not see that? Even if he doesn't want to talk about what it did to him, he could stop diverting from the topic.

“Here let me get the door for you,” Ryan suggests and proceeds forwards without waiting for confirmation. If Graham doesn’t want to speak about what happened then he’ll help out in other ways.

Graham nods and breathes out to sike himself up when he enters the room, but the urge to turn and leave is strong when he spots Yaz sleeping soundly on the bed, his eyes lingering on her neck and bruises. He slowly makes his way around her and takes a seat opposite her. The coldness from the floor is irritating, so he pulls his feet upwards and onto the seat while staring at Yaz as he wraps his arms around them.

“What are you doing?”

Graham blinks and focuses on Ryan instead. “What?”

“Why are you sitting like that?”

“Like what?”

“With your legs pulled up-” Ryan frowns and comes around the bed. “What is going on? You’re acting strange.”

“Nothing is going on.”

“You’ve never sat like that before-”

Graham goes to reply, but his eyes catch on Yaz’s stirring form, and he swallows nervously as she wakes up and blinks around the room, eyes latching onto Ryan first.

“Ryan?” Yaz wonders and then she spots the figure occupying the chair that the Doctor was sat on earlier staring at her and without warning she flinches back before remembering that although those are the eyes that gazed at her and those are the hands that grabbed her, they aren’t the creatures, they never were… and she just flinched at them; she just flinched at Graham. Safe and reliable grandfatherly Graham who wouldn’t hurt any of them willingly and she jumped back in fear.

Yaz swears internally when she sees the hurt expression flash across Graham’s face, and she feels like she’s just kicked a puppy. “I’m sorry, Grah-”

“Nah, love, I get it,” Graham mumbles, his eyes now turning away from her and locking onto the floor instead. Perhaps he shouldn’t have come here. Stupid and reckless. Of course she would flinch; it was his face and hands that landed her in that bed, his weakness that allowed the creature to take control of him. “I really do.”

“No, Graham,” Damn it… she wasn’t expecting to see him, and the last thing she remembered was those eyes and face staring at her in hate, she honestly thought it would be simple to differentiate between them, but waking up and seeing them, she sighs. “I’m sorry-”

“It’s fine, Yaz.” Graham cuts her off again and starts to get up. “Look, this was probably the worst idea I’ve had thinking ’bout it, cause I’m actually feeling... _tired_.” He looks at Ryan. “You were right, probably shouldn’t have removed those IVs.”

Graham stands to his full height, but he doesn’t meet Yaz’s eyes again. “I’m sorry for what it did to you, Yaz, that’s all I wanted to say.” He says quickly before walking forward and brushing past Ryan. “I’m-” He shrugs and turns away from her.

“Graham, stop-” Yaz says with urgency. “ _Please_.” She waits and sends thanks when he does stop, but with his back turned to her, she can see his own injuries covered up and poking through the same style of white scrubs that she has on. Her mind brings the image of his blood-stained clothes and to see the number of bandages across his exposed arms shows her what it did to him. “I’m sorry for flinching,” Yaz says. “I wasn’t expecting you to be there.” She catches the clenching of his hands and then the shake to them. “I don’t blame you, Graham, please, you don’t have to leave.”

The only reply she gets is a nod, and then Graham escapes from the room, the door swiftly closing behind him. She leans back against the bed. “Well, shit.”

“Should I go after him?” Ryan questions with his eyes locked onto the closed door.

Yaz opens her eyes again and turns to Ryan, finally remembering that he was stood there. “Oh, Ryan, I’m sorry.”

Ryan looks to her, and his face is a mixture of emotions. “I understand Yaz, I truly do-” He looks to the door again. “I knew I should’ve stopped him from coming here.”

“No, I shouldn’t have flinched,” Yaz repeats with remorse. “I just wasn’t expecting him to be there,” She explains.

“No Yaz, I should’ve entered first and warned you... not allowed us to wake you up, but I was so preoccupied with him that I didn’t think about you,” Ryan explains before falling onto the bench and resting his arms upon his knees, his body sagging with exhaustion and stress. “This entire thing is a fucking mess.”

Yaz can’t disagree with his assessment of the events that lead them all back to Resus One. “Where is the Doctor now?”

Ryan shrugs. “She left when he asked for time alone-” He says.

“Time alone?”

“When he first woke up, the Doctor told him that she locked the creature away instead of killing it and he sorta, flipped out-” Ryan reveals as he looks back up to Yaz again.

“Flipped out?”

Ryan gestures widely. “It tortured him, Yaz, and he refused to tell me exactly what it did to him,” He says. “It’s not just what it did to him though; it’s what it did to us… and I think all he can see is the fact that it used his body to do it, he blames himself. He talked about his hands.”

“And it doesn’t help that I just flinched,” Yaz points out with guilt.

Ryan inclines his head. “Knew he shouldn’t have come, should’ve prepared you rather than just let him walk here and assume it would be okay.”

“What did he want the Doctor to do with it?” Yaz asks suddenly, mostly wanting to change the subject and distract Ryan.

Ryan frowns at her. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, she locked it away, what did he want her to do to it instead? You said he didn’t like that she locked it in its own prison.”

“He wants it dead, Yaz,” Ryan explains.

“Like Tzim-Sha?”

“No, he wanted to kill him for revenge Yaz, this was- This, he just wants it dead, wants it so it can’t hurt anyone ever again… and I think he’s terrified of it getting back into him again.”

“The Doctor said that it couldn’t get out.”

“She did, but I don’t think he believes that.”

Yaz sighs and brings a hand up to her sore head. “Maybe he’s right though,” She says as Ryan focuses on her again. “Just this time we-”

“Kill something?”

“I don’t know Ryan; it hurt us all… and if it helps Graham, then maybe we should.”

Ryan stares at her and breathes out with sheer tiredness. “I think before we do anything, we all need to take time to just step back and think… and heal. We're talking about taking that extra step that the Doctor never allowed us to take, we dont kill things... even if they are deserving of it.”

Yaz nods, accepting his answer for the time being. “Where do you think he’s going to go?”

Ryan looks to the door, and his heart aches to rush after the man, and he could leave, go now and quickly catch up to his grandad, but maybe the man does need time alone. Proper time alone to construct everything that happened to him. “I hope it’s back to his room, but I’m not so sure-” Ryan turns to Yaz again. “Should I tell Mabli that he’s gone, or the Doctor?”

“I don’t know, Ryan, probably- just in case he gets himself in trouble.”

Ryan nods and stands again, joints aching with tiredness and lack of sleep. “I’ll let them know now that he’s gone,” He frowns slightly. “But maybe I won’t tell them that I didn’t stop him, because I probably won’t hear the end of it.”

* * *

Graham really doesn’t know where he’s going, not back to his room and- He slumps against the nearest wall breathing hard. What the hell was he thinking about? Going to Yaz’s room without warning honestly has to be the most stupid idea he’s ever had recently... He pushes himself from the wall again and proceeds onwards with no goals in mind. He just needs to walk, needs to find solitude, somewhere he’s not going to get disturbed for a while, and as he rounds the corner he comes face to face with something very familiar-

The TARDIS.

And he stares at the ancient ship with apprehension. The Doctor, she said she locked it away in there… but it is solitude, and it’s not like they could find him quickly if he enters the ship... and he does trust the ship to keep the creature away from him. It would give him time to think as well and to do it in a place that he knows. A place that has statistically always been safe.

He steps forward, pain gripping at him inside from the strenuous activity he’s partaken in today. As Graham gets closer to the ship, he reaches out and rests a shaking hand on the door, the wood warm welcoming under his touch. Comforting.

After a moment, the door opens, beckoning him in and he breathes in the air… fresh and not at all like the hospital smell he hates. The next feeling is the warmth, and he almost leans into it with relief, feet carrying him forward and onto the grated floor.

“I want to go to my room,” Graham asks the room for once, deciding to trust that the ship will actually listen to him. It’s not like he’d be able to understand her, not like the Doc anyway, if she does listen and complies with his request.

He starts making his way to where his room is usually located and thankfully when he gets to the door and pushes against it he finds that it is and not a broom cupboard that’s he been lead to before, back when he called her a thing.

Graham enters his room of solace, eyes moving across it and landing on his things. Pictures, and weirdly enough smells of home. He was never sure how the TARDIS managed to make it seem like home, but she did, and at this moment in time he’s grateful it, he needs the feel of his house, of Sheffield. Of safety, and although he’s currently in the same ship that the creature is locked away in, he feels at peace, kinda, well as much as one could feel after having a sociopathic space rock overtake you and hurt your friends and yourself-

“You’re thinking about me again.”

Graham ignores the image he’s conjured again, for the time being anyway as he makes his way to his bed to lie down on. The intimacy of the bed offering comfort.

“You can’t ignore me, Graham, because I am apart of you.”

He stares up at the ceiling, which strangely enough looks like the one in his room back on Earth before turning to face himself. “How can I ignore something I think up? It’s not like you’re gonna stop speaking.”

The image smirks back at himself. “You didn’t reply though, thought you were ignoring me, it’s not nice to ignore people.”

“You aren’t people, you’re just-” He looks up at the ceiling again. “You’re nothing, you’re not real, and I’m crazy for talking to like you are.”

“Crazy, perhaps, perhaps not.” The visage replies as he makes his way around the bed to occupy the other side. “Stressed, definitely though.”

Graham glares at it for daring to take that side, her side. “So what is this, a hallucination or something? Or have I truly lost a sense of what is real and what isn’t?”

The image shrugs. “The girl flinched at you,” Graham rolls over, refusing to look into that smug face. His smug face. “Oh, come on, Graham, don’t be like that. I’m just pointing out what she did, and if I’m honest, she does have good reason to fear you.”

“She doesn’t fear me…” She doesn’t, does she? Graham asks himself internally. “She fears you.”

“Why don’t you try saying that in a tone that sounds believable, Graham?”

“You’re not real!” Graham snaps back. “I know what you are… you’re just something I’m picturing.”

“I am real though Graham, real to you anyway and that’s what’s most important, isn’t it?”

When he wanted solitude, he was expecting actual time alone, but his traitorous brain insists and bringing up his internal anxieties. “I don’t need to be psychoanalysed by an image I personally conjured myself.”

“So stop thinking about me then, isn’t it that simple? You’ve made me disappear before, why not just do it again?”

And damn, if it didn’t just point out the blinding truth to him… he could stop this thing from speaking to him if he only chose to ignore it… and not to indulge in torturing himself for actions he never committed.

Graham rolls back over again and stares at the image properly… and he could make it go, but he doesn’t. No, perhaps he does need to have a talk with himself.

“Talk.”

 


	15. Chapter 15

_ A week later… _

 

“Hold up, you four,” Mabli calls out, causing the Doctor to stop and look back. “Don’t think you’re escaping without saying goodbye, Doctor.” She points and then looks to the humans with her. “And you three.” Mabli spots the soft smile on Yaz’s face and the nod of Ryan’s head, but she looks behind them, eyes lingering on the still form of Graham who only stares to the floor. "A proper goodbye this time."

The Doctor has a moment of looking like she’s been caught, nose wrinkling. “I’m not one for goodbyes.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Mabli smiles at her as she takes her eyes of Graham and focuses on the Doctor. “To say I hope I don’t see any of you again would be an understatement,” She says with slight tiredness mixed with warmth. “You are by far the worst patients-” Mabli gestures mainly towards the Doctor. “-that I’ve ever treated.”

Yaz and Ryan smirk at her while t he Doctor scrunches her face, knowing exactly how difficult she’s been out of the four of them. What with breaking into her office, to wondering the halls between the rooms, and fiddling around with equipment. In her defence though, she did make a lot of stuff work at a better efficiency, and she fails to see how that was  _ irresponsible _ and how she shouldn't have done it while it was on. How else was she meant to know if it worked or not?

“Never was a big fan of hospitals; every single one I’ve been in has tried to kill me.” The Doctor looks upwards, brows furrowed in thought before she looks back at Mabli again. “Thinking about it, one did actually.”

Mabli stares back at the Doctor and shakes her head, deciding that that is best left packed away and judging by the sudden surprise on Yaz’s face, she’s in agreement. “What will you do now?”

“Oh, you know,” The Doctor speaks eyes darting around. “Back in the box, stuff to see and places to be.” She focuses back on Mabli again. “Thank you, Mabli, for everything-” She looks back at Yaz and then flicks her eyes to Graham. She frowns at the current demeanour he’s picked up, eyes always avoiding theirs as he locks himself away from them, physically and mentally. “Thank you.”

"Yeah, deffo, mate," Ryan adds. "From all of us, we really appreciate it."

Mabli nods. “You’re welcome, all of you, it was the least I could do for you and you all saved my life before.”

“Yes, well, we’ll be off now,” The Doctor repeats herself from earlier, body and feet turning away from Mabli. “Come on you lot, TARDIS-”

“Actually-” Mabli cuts in again, once again bringing pause to the Doctor. “Before you all go, I would like a private word with you, Doctor.”

The Doctor turns back around again, and she can’t help the annoyance playing across her features. She wants to get them all away from this place, and its memories… they’ve stayed too long as it is and every second they remain here Graham becomes more distant. She needs to get him to open up in a more personal and familiar setting, somewhere that doesn’t have that hospital smell he hates or the rooms that act like a prison with their lack of windows.

“It won’t take long, Mabli?”

“Not long at all, Doctor, just a few words. Doctor to Doctor.”

The Doctor nods and looks back at her friends, eyes straying to them all. “It’s alright if you three want to wait in the TARDIS, this won’t take long.”

Graham wastes no time in turning and walking away, never once stopping to say anything to Mabli as he opens the door and enters. Ryan stares after his grandad, and he hesitates before looking back at them all. “I’m going to check on him cause he’s being quiet again.”

“I’ll come with you,” Yaz says, but she feels the nervousness rise within her. Graham has hardly spoken to her, and when he had to, it’s been short sentences. “But he’ll probably speak to you rather than me.”

Ryan chews the inside of his mouth. “He doesn’t mean it-”

“I know, Ryan, I know,” Yaz interrupts. They’ve had this conversation, but her flinch when she first spotted him has really soured their interactions now. The worst thing about it is that it’s Graham doing it, and continuing even after she tries to convince him that she doesn’t blame him. It goes well at first, and he opens up partially, and then he heads away again, and it’s the same distance he had before when they meet again. Like- well, she doesn’t know.

“Come on, Yaz,” Ryan says when he sees the concerned look on his mates face. “The quicker we’re back in the TARDIS and heading home, the better, right?”

Yaz nods and looks back to the Doctor. “We’ll be in the console room waiting for you, Doctor.”

The Doctor smiles at her and watches as they both enter the TARDIS. “What did you want to talk about?”

Mabli looks over to the TARDIS before facing the Doctor again. “It’s about Graham-”

“Thought as much.”

“He’s not the man I knew, he’s distant and-”

“He’s been through a lot, Mabli,” The Doctor interjects, defensively on his behalf. “He’s bound to be trying to sort it out in his own time.”

“And that’s what concerns me, Doctor. What he experienced was a harrowing thing, and that’s not to mention the trauma from the torture.” Mabli explains. “In my medical opinion, he’s shut down and dissociated from everything, you, Ryan, Yaz, eating and drinking unless it placed in front of him. He doesn’t respond to anything, and when he does, it’s either with annoyance or indifference.”

The Doctor takes in a deep breath and places her hands on her hips. “I know, Mabli-” Her hearts ache for Graham. She knows what torture does to a person; she knows the scars that it leaves on the soul. “I know.”

“The wounds may be healed, but they’re on his body and a constant presence. They’re a reminder to him. What he needs is time, but-” Mabli shrugs, arms wide. “I’m not that kind of Doctor.”

The Doctor eyes harden, and she brings a hand up to her eyes, resting it against them. “Thank you for what you’ve done Mabli, but this is where we part ways now.” She says, walking towards the TARDIS. “We all need time to heal, and I know he needs time. I will watch him and-” she sighs again. “-if I have to, I will care for him. He’s my responsibility because I had a duty of care to him and them and I failed.”  _ Again _ . She finishes within her head. “Goodbye, Mabli, thanks again.”

Mabli nods. “I wish you and your friends the best, Doctor.” She says, her eyes watching as the Doctor turns and steps into the TARDIS without saying anything else. She hears the great engines start up and watches as the ancient ship vanishes from view. Staring in the space that the ship has had for the last week she sends a prayer their way, wishing them safe travels before turning and heading back to work, her mind turning away from the worry those four caused her.

* * *

 

The Doctor makes her way around the console, gently hitting levers and switches and sending the TARDIS into the Time Vortex to sit idle while her friends finish healing. She looks up and watches each of her them. Yaz waves her concern away, and she gestures to Ryan and Graham, and she watches as Ryan tries to engage Graham into a quiet conversation, but the older man avoids his gaze. His hands stuffed in his pockets.

“The TARDIS is safely within the Time Vortex,” The Doctor says suddenly and loudly, causing Ryan and Graham, surprisingly, to look at her. “We’ll be here for a while.”

“We’re not going back to Sheffield?”

“Not at the moment, Ryan,” The Doctor says with a shake of her head as she walks around the console, heading towards the two men. “Yaz is still recovering, she can’t do her job with a head wound-” She catches Graham stiffen at the mention of Yaz’ injury. “-They need time to heal and preferably without people asking too many questions.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Ryan says and then turns to look back at Graham again. “Do you want a drink or something, gramps?”

“No.”

“You haven’t had-”

“I said no, Ryan,” Graham says as his hand clenches the fabric of the leg of his trousers. “I’m fine, I just-” He looks up, vibrant blue eyes now distant and grey. “Quite frankly I just wanna go back to Sheffield.”

“Graham, we can’t at the-”

“Moment.” Graham cuts her off.  “I got that, Doc, look, why can’t you just drop me back off?” Graham asks, stepping forward and showing more life than he has in the past few days. “Then you can stay here while Yaz-” He stops, hands forming fists as his breath hitches. “-just drop me  _ back _ .”

The Doctor shakes her head. She’s not going to leave him by himself, not when he’s had to deal with something traumatic. This will probably be the point where he dislikes her, but she has to stay firm. “It’s better that we stay here, Graham-”

“How is it better?!” He snaps at her, making Ryan and Yaz look at him in shock. “I just- I just-” He closes his eyes, willing and trying his hardest to push down what he’s feeling. “I just want to go back, that’s all.” His eyes dart around, and if they weren’t currently shocked about him snapping, they would spot them focusing on an empty space in the distance. “Please.”

“Hey, gramps-” Ryan says, reaching forward and pulling back when Graham flinches away from his touch, eyes suddenly locking onto his grandson. “We’re safe now-”

“No, we aren’t, not with that-” He pauses, breathing hard and hands tightly squeezing shut. “-not with that thing here.”

“Graham, the Doctor and the TARDIS have locked it away; it can’t harm us,” Yaz says, coming forward as well.

Graham looks up at Yaz, eyes locked on the very faded bruises on her neck and then to his hands. “It already did though,” He looks up at them all again. “And how can you trust it not to break out?” His expression turns into a glare as he stares at the Doctor. “Why can’t you just destroy it? Why do you have to keep it alive?”

“Graham, I can’t-”

“If you say you can’t kill it cause it goes against your moral code or whatever bollocks then let me do it, and then you can kick me from the TARDIS.” Graham snaps in anger, his arm waving in the direction of the Doctor. “It deserves to die for what it did.”

“I wasn’t going to say that Graham,” The Doctor says, stepping closer to him. “I could’ve killed it and-” she breathes out. “-I wanted to, but it would’ve got off easy. What I did to it was something worse.” She reaches a hand out to Graham, but he pulls away from her touch as well. “It will never be able to get out of there, Graham, believe me.”

Graham steps back from them. “Are you sure about that, Doctor? Cause if it- If it gets out again… I can’t have it in me again.”

“You’re safe here; the TARDIS will always be safe.”

“Will it?” asks Graham as he brings his hands up and runs them together nervously. “Cause I don’t feel bloody safe with that psychotic rock here and it wasn’t safe with that Dalek.” He says, gesturing now.

“Gramps,” says Ryan, stepping forward. “It can’t get out.”

“How do you know that?” Graham asks again before he looks directly at the Doctor, eyes now altogether avoiding Ryan and Yaz. “Take me back to Sheffield.”

The Doctor shakes her head. “I can’t-”

“Why can’t you?” Graham repeats. “I’m healed, and I’m retired, no one will ask me what-” His face twists. “-what happened, so you can just take me back.”

The Doctor walks forward, and she spots Graham’s narrowed eyes scrutinising her. “Graham what happened to you needs to be talked about; you can’t bury-”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You can’t bottle up what happened, gramps.”

Graham frowns at them all, finally spotting the pincer attack they’ve made on him. “I don’t want to.” He says, defining each word. “I just want to go back home,” He looks to the Doctor. “You can’t keep me here.” Her gaze tells him that she can, and he glares at her.  “What am I now your prisoner?” 

The Doctor’s eyes widen. “No, Graham, you’re not, but you’ve been through something horrendous,” She takes a step towards him. “I need to know how you’re holding up.”

“Please, Graham, you can talk to us-” Yaz says, deciding to join in. “We’re family.”

Graham stares at all of them, and he sees their concern, their care and love and- and he doesn’t deserve it. He’s spoken to himself, in his heart he knows that the image staring at him is fake but talking to it… indulging in it, helped. Or so he thought before it twisted what he meant and made things confusing.

_ “They don’t trust you, Graham,” It speaks, and he looks to where it’s leaning against the console. “They probably think you’re insane, two cans short of a six-pack, and all those sayings.” _

Graham grinds his jaw, brows furrowed with an irritated look on his face as he takes his eyes from his double and looks back to his  _ family _ . “Fine, then.”

“Fine? What does that mean?” Ryan questions as Graham shrugs and turns to walk away. “Where are you going?”

“To my room, where that rock isn’t,” Graham replies as he starts walking, his hands buried in the pockets of his jacket. Ryan starts to follow. “By myself, Ryan.” He turns and looks back at the three of them. “I am capable of being by myself; you know that, right? I don’t need people in my shadow all the damn time.”

Ryan stops and watches on as he turns again and makes a swift exit from the console room.

“Can’t you destroy it, Doctor? The tiara, cause it would make it easier on him. I can’t imagine what it’s like to know it’s here.” Yaz wonders, voice low and sad.

“Destroying it won’t solve the issues Graham has.”

Ryan gives the Doctor a sideways glance. “But wouldn’t it help? I get what you did by locking it away, but surely destroying it would be better than keeping it locked up.”

“No one will be able to find it, the TARDIS will make sure of that and-” She looks to where Graham went. “-and it’s not my concern at the moment, he is, and he’s suffering.”

“I catch him staring at my neck and head, Doctor,” Yaz says, now looking to Ryan. “and I bet you catch him looking at your neck as well, Ryan.” He nods in confirmation. “He shuts himself away, refusing to talk about it.”

“That’s the most he’s ever said in a long while, Doctor,” Ryan added. “I just want him back how he was, not this; anger and fear mixed together, that’s not the caring man I know and love.”

The Doctor, as much as she wants to reassure them both that he’ll be fine, she can't. A physical wound causes issues, but it heals, mostly depending on what it is but internal scars? That’s something else entirely, and she knows this from a personal level. “We have to give him time; there’s no easy fix for what he’s gone through.”

She turns around and heads towards the display screen, clicking on a few panels and bringing up a reading of Graham’s position and vitals within the TARDIS. A possible breach of trust, perhaps, but she wants to know precisely where he is and if he was true to his word about where he was going.

“You two should get some rest, you especially Yaz,” The Doctor reminds, eyes reading the data on the screen. She breathes out a sigh of relief when the TARDIS informs her that Graham was true to his word. She looks back up at Ryan and Yaz. “We’ll stay in the vortex for a while.”

“If it’s all the same to you, Doctor, I’m going to make something for him to eat and drink, even if he said he didn’t want anything,” Ryan explains before exiting the room and leaving Yaz and the Doctor behind.

“It’s fine for you to rest as well, Yaz.”

Yaz smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. She walks over to the Doctor, hand reaching out and gently holding onto her arm. “And what about you? You went through an ordeal just as much as we did; you should rest as well.”

The Doctor returns her smile. “I will Yaz, at some point but you humans, you need more rest than I do and I wasn’t injured like you were.”

Yaz nods, but there’s worry on her face. “I’ll catch you later then, but please get something, Doctor.”

The Doctor nods and watches as the last member of her Fam leaves, she leans back against the TARDIS console, exhaustion and anxiety radiating off her. Yaz is right, she should rest but she can’t, not at the moment and not when she needs to keep an eye on Graham.

They might’ve not picked up on the focused looks aimed at empty spaces, but she has, and it concerns her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A time skip because I want to keep what Graham and his 'friend' have been talking about unknown. (and it's not because I tried to figure out what to write and went haha what)
> 
> And I'm trying to work out how to display that inner voice. I have OCD and I did have pretty severe anxiety/depression before I got therapy so I'm basing it on the intrusive voices I had if that makes sense?


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warning: This is heavy and there is a panic attack type thing in it.
> 
> Oh, and a slight spoiler for the Doctor Who book The Good Doctor.

“Capable of being by yourself, really Graham?” The visage says next to him, which he ignores in favour of making it back to his room in a timely manner. “That's hardly the truth, is it? You fear to be alone; it's why you imagine me.” It walks with his steps. "I'm your imaginary friend."

Now Graham looks to it, withdrawn eyes locked to its face. His face, but it’s all muddled now. Like a cracked mirror, reflecting a distorted image of himself. It’s not real, but separating fact from reality isn’t easy now. He knows this is fake, just an overly active imagination that’s been under a lot of stress, to put it mildly, that indulged in whatever this torture is. "You're not my friend."

He turns his head away from it, eyes now refusing even to acknowledge its smug face… but he can’t deny that it doesn’t make sense, what it says… and what it twists. It’s always twisting everything, arguing back and making him doubt himself… calling him crazy. Is he though? Wouldn't anyone who went through what he did come out the other side, different? That’s what it said back in that house...

_“And you might come to be like me when you’re subjugated to torture.”_

Rings out through his mind and he clenches his jaw shut, eyes locked dead ahead. No, he’s nothing like that creature. He never wanted to hurt his friends and family. If he did then the guilt and shame, he currently has wouldn't be tearing him apart, like- like what it did to him back in the-

He stumbles back against the wall, hand gripping at his chest and he squeezes his eyes shut, trying his hardest to force what he’s feeling back down again. He stays there, panting and heart thumping in his chest. He needs to get to his room and away from the possibility of anyone finding him, quickly, so he begs the TARDIS, pleading for her to show him the way, hoping that the ship will pick up on it like she usually does.

Graham opens his eyes and breathes out with relief when he spots his door, never in the same place but the ship, she always leads him there when he wants to get there quickly, and she’s done it again, at least there is someone who has his back his traitorous mind adds. He rushes forward and enters immediately, slamming the door shut behind him as he leans back against it and closes his eyes, mind spinning with thoughts, but the most he feels is a relief.

“So we’re alone now.” It pauses. "in a way."

He opens his eyes and focuses onto the visage. “I’m alone, you, you ain't here.” He finally says back to it, hand gesturing harshly in its direction and trying to back his statement up, but his voice wavers through his intakes of breath.

“You talk to me like I am, you indulge in me.”

Graham turns his attention away from it and makes his way into his bedroom and away from the door. He kicks off his shoes without care before lying down on the bed and facing the opposite wall. Grace wouldn't want him to lie on a bed with shoes on, and for her, that was the only reason he took them off. His jacket, on the other hand, that's something he likes to keep on. It hides things he hates looking at and thinking about-

“You’re ignoring me.”

Technically he’s ignoring nothing because it isn't there. No matter how real it seems. How convincing it is... He scowls at the wall and closes his eyes again, willing it away and trying to think of anything else.

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t speak to me,” The spectre says. “Because I’m already in that head of yours-”

Graham sits up quickly and glares at the image. “No, you’re not!”

“Got your attention.” It smugly replies. “And how sure can you be?”

“I trust the Doctor,” Graham answers. “She got you out and locked you away.”

"Did she? You weren't so convinced in the console room... and-" The visage paces across the room, it’s body free and fluid as it stares at Graham like a lion eyeing up a meal. “-She lies.”

“No-”

“She said you would be coming home, but she’s got you stuck, no, _locked_ up in her ship.” It says, now stopping and leaning towards Graham. “The Doctor lies, the creature read right through her.”

Graham tears his head away from it and tries to focus on anything else within his room. She doesn’t lie; she doesn’t-

_“My rules change all the time.”_

Does that count as lying? Or is it skirting the edge of lying at least? No, she promised to get them back, and she did. That wasn’t a lie; she honoured that promise, and she got the DNA bombs out of them. She's honest.

“She got us back,” Graham says with earnest. “She said she would, and she did-”

“Then she got you stuck on a ship, after getting you stuck in space,” It interjects as it makes its way back round to him again and cocks its head to the side. “You were nearly tortured before, weren’t you?” Graham doesn’t reply as his hands instinctively rub at his wrists. “You were, back on that planet with the dog people. That man Mykados, he had you strapped to a chair for hours.” It smiles.

“She was locked up as well; she could hardly stop that from happening,” Graham argues back at himself. “I don’t blame her for that.” He frowns. “And it didn’t happen.”

The manifestation of his inner turmoil stares back with a vindictive smirk. “But it happened this time, didn’t it? You were tortured.”

His hands clench and he looks down at his arms, hidden away under the leather of his jacket, but underneath he can picture the scars he so carefully hides now. Graham leans forward and rests his head in his hands, mind stumbling through his raging thoughts. Everything is mixing together like a storm upon the open ocean, churning it all up and making it hard to sort through.

“What about the next time?” It continues, digging into his worries and insecurities. “Something else could get ahold of you because you're weak. The weakest of them all. That's why it picked you and not the any of the others,” It comes closer to him. “And something else could dig into those wounds you have because you're weak.” Graham’s breathing hitches and he shakes his head, eyes avoiding looking at the image. “Or maybe something stronger than it could get ahold of Ryan and Yaz on a trip with the Doctor.” It's inches away from him now, and he hates it. Hates looking at its face. "And hurt them like you did."

“NO!” Graham shouts, now standing and glaring in hate at himself. He points a hand at his insidious nightmare. “I didn’t do it; you did it!”

“But you did, though. Those hands, your hands. They wrapped around her throat and threw her into a wall.” It steps towards him. “And she flinched at you. Not the creature, she specifically flinched at _you_.”

“Shut up.” Graham snaps with anger, his hands shaking. “ _Please_.”

It moves away from him, giving him a chance to breathe again, which he obliges and takes advantage of. “Make me shut up.”

Graham tries, he really does, but he can’t. No matter how much he wishes it away, he can’t because he knows it’ll come back and hurt him again. Torment him and make it harder, more confusing. Like it’s done all week when he was alone. Like it’s doing now.

“You can’t, can you?”

He stares down at the floor and sobs. The stress, the guilt… it’s all too much. He wants out, out from his room, out from the TARDIS, out from… _everything_. He turns sharply and heads to the door, throwing it open and walking in any direction.

It doesn’t come back as he storms through the ship with no goal in sight. Graham knows for the time being it’s done its job… dug into him and made everything so much harder to deal with. He should’ve realised that talking to it was foolhardy in the first place because it only makes it worse.

But then Yaz flinched at him and- and… oh, she flinched at him. It was right; it always is. He stops and leans against the wall, chest rising and falling with gasping breaths. He slides down the wall, his conscience thoughts not paying attention to the vulnerable position he’s allowed himself to get in.

“You can’t escape me,” It says, within his head or manifested again. He isn’t sure because he refuses to remove his shaking hands pressed against his face and eyes, refuses to acknowledge it. “You have to face everything, Graham; you can’t keep running from it and burying everything inside.”

There’s a pressure building within him, and he keeps shaking his head, mouth muttering and pleading for the voice to stop. He swallows nervously, the motion thick and painful, his mouth and throat are dry, his hands are quivering and clammy against his face, the back of his neck burns hot and uncomfortable, and the feeling of dread sits within him as the sick feeling grows in his stomach.

“Bottling it up and pushing it down will not help you, Graham.” It says, voice loud and unwavering. “You need to confront it before you end up pushing everyone you love away-”

“SHUT UP!” Graham yells, eyes locked on its face as his fear and panic grows. “Shut up.” He pleads, tears falling as he takes in rapid breaths. Never enough to make it seem like he’s actually breathing though.

It’s too much, everything is, and it has come to a breaking point as he loses his composure in a corridor… one that if he were paying attention to where the TARDIS was leading him, he would recognise it. Or more precisely recognise the door that’s currently opening, revealing a puzzled Yaz who looks down the corridor and spots him.

“Graham,” Yaz says with concern. “Oh my days.” She heads down the corridor; her eyes focused on the man she considers as much of a grandad as Ryan does, who is currently having what looks to be a panic attack. “Graham.” She says again, voice strong and loud.

Graham loses focus on the image staring at him as he turns to look towards the newer voice, spotting Yaz for the first time. He tries to speak, but his voice gets lost through the quick breaths struggling to oxygenate his tired body. He trembles, body and soul are finally losing themselves to what he's buried over the week.

Yaz shakes her head and kneels to his level, her steady hands taking his shaking ones. “Don’t speak, you just have to focus on breathing, Graham.” She orders. She’s first aid trained and she knows how to help with a panic attack, but she never expected ever to see her older friend go through one though. “Watch and breath with me, in and out and hold between.”

They both stay still within the corridor, the only sound around them is Graham’s frantic, but thankfully, lessening breathing as they synchronise it together. Yaz smiles, encouragingly at Graham, and she squeezes his hands.

“There, you can probably think a lot clearer now, Graham,” Yaz says with kindness. "Just carry on breathing like that."

Graham looks away from her and trains his eyes on a spot on the floor, eyes catching his hands held in Yaz’s in the process. “I’m sorry.” He whispers and pulls his hands free, wrapping them around his aching chest as he continues to follow her advice.

Yaz furrows her brows at Graham. “Whatever for?” She asks while taking a seat opposite him.

“For everything,” Graham shrugs, voice listless and empty. “For hurting you, for refusing to see you, for hurting Ryan, and the Doc… everything.” He looks up, eyes exhausted and red. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh, Graham.” Yaz sighs and she sees his vulnerability for the first time. One he probably hid behind the annoyance and anger… and fear he’s had over the last week. “You have nothing to be sorry about, and I mean that because what happened wasn’t your fault.”

“I was weak,” Graham says, mind staying on what the image called him. “And my weakness caused you three to be hurt and- and it wasn’t just the fact that you were, Yaz, it was the fact that it could’ve killed you... that I would've been responsible for it.” He explains. “I- I tried to make a deal with it, tried to make it so it would let you three go, but it didn’t work and only made it worse.”

“You weren’t weak, Graham,” Yaz counters with a levelled voice. “You stopped it, caused it to pause." She says. "Ryan and the Doctor told me what happened after-” She catches Graham stiffen at the mention of what it did to her, and she moves away from that. “Basically they told me that you fought long enough for the Doctor to pull it from your head, that makes you strong, Graham, it does.”

“Not strong enough to stop it in the beginning.” Graham murmurs. His eyes look up and into Yaz’s own eyes. “I didn’t care what it did to me… I didn’t, but my one wish was for it never to hurt you three, and it did.” He catches Yaz about to open her mouth, and he shakes his head, making her close it again. “It hurt you with my hands Yaz,” He gestures with them. “That- that doesn’t wash off, it sits there and festers, and digs in until it points out all your failings to you.” His panic rises, but he returns to breathing steadily again.

Yaz frowns at Graham. “What do you mean?”

He laughs, the sound hollow and lacking any warmth. “Oh, if you don’t think I’m already crazy you will after I tell you.”

“Tell me what, Graham?”

He leans his head back against the TARDIS wall, and he feels the power and warmth of the ship pressing against him, offering comfort in a way.

“Graham?”

He flicks his eyes down to her, stomach-churning with nerves. If he tells her, she’ll tell the Doc, and then Ryan would find out, but if he doesn’t… then she’ll still tell the Doc how she found him. Crying and having a panic attack in the middle of the corridor leading to her room. There’s a part of him that knows the TARDIS must’ve led him here on purpose… so perhaps she’s just as traitorous as the rest of them, including his mind. Mainly his mind being the traitor though.

Graham looks away again and to the point where it was stood mere moments ago, and he breathes out when he finds the space vacant. “In times of stress,” He starts to explain, brows furrowing. “Or grieving… I did something, something that has helped in the past, but I… I never did it for long because it got too much for me.”

Yaz waits and watches his face, eyes catching the emotive swallowing and the fading shake to his hands. She brings her eyes to his face again, and she can’t help but see how much he’s aged in the last week. Eyes heavy and with pain behind them. He even looks thinner and paler and haggard. They lock eyes again, and she sees the sheen to them, so she smiles at him instead, which he doesn't return. Not that she expected him to.

“What did you do?”

Graham brings his hands to his knees, resting them against them and then brushing his thumbs against the fabric of his jeans. “I pictured-” He pauses and focuses back on Yaz’s face again. “When my mum died, when Grace passed I- I pictured them, you know, what they’d say or do, even tell them what I’ve been up to.” His tears escape, and he swallows dryly, breath coming in shaky but manageable intakes. “It helped in ways.”

“And you pictured them? Grace and your mum?”

“No,” He says with a shake of his head. “I pictured something _worse_.”

Yaz widens her eyes as he stares at her, and she can’t help but fidget under his gaze and the implication of what he just revealed about what he visualised. “You pictured-” She cuts herself off, unsure at how to continue.

“Yes and no,” Graham answers her unfinished question. “It was him, maybe… at the start, but then it-” His brows furrow and he looks away. “It was an amalgamation… of everything... and I knew it wasn’t real because it felt like- like the times I remembered Grace.” He looks back to Yaz. “So I indulged and spoke to it like I did with her, and it helped until it- until it didn’t.”

“You should’ve said something, Graham.”

Graham chuckles, and this time, there is the barest hint of a smile on his face, instant, but fleeting and gone in a matter of moments. “How?” He asks, looking back at her. “I would’ve sounded like a lunatic… hell, I sound like a lunatic because who talks to themselves? Who lets their inner struggle… just torment them?” He questions, not expecting an answer. “It wasn't that I didn’t trust you, but- but it… made everything harder.”

“But I know now, and we can help you,” Yaz says with conviction as she gets up and moves to his side of the corridor, her hand taking his in the process. “We can work through this together, Graham, all four of us.” She smiles at him. “Like a family.”

He stares back at her, and for the first time in a while. He feels something other than shame and guilt. “Or a fam.”

Yaz smiles brightly and squeezes his hand before getting up and extending it down to him. “Come on,” She orders with a gesture of her hand. “We’re having a TARDIS chat.”

“TARDIS chat?” Graham probes before reaching out and taking her hand in his and accepting her help in pulling him off the floor. His legs ache at the movement, but he ignores them.

“Over tea and biscuits.” Graham hesitates, weight moving from foot to foot and she spots the nervous shuffle. “We need to talk, Graham. Talking will help.”

“I know, it’s just-” He shrugs and exhales. “If we are to talk then you need to know what it did to me-” Yaz frowns are him. “-what it completely did to me, and it’s not something I want to-” He takes in a deep breath and focuses back on her face again. “It’s not something I ever wanted you three to fully know.”

Yaz’s brain catches up to what he’s hinting at she can’t help but feel sickened at the reminder of what he went through. “About what it did while we were-” She takes in a breath as well. “When you told us- told us about the celler?”

Graham nods, voice refusing to come forward while his brain brings up the vivid memories, his throat aches with the screams he made when it tortured him. “Everything.” He looks away. “And you'd understand why I want it dead, because it wasn’t just what it did to me-” His eyes narrow. “It’s what it wanted to do to you, what it did to the people before us-” He looks back to Yaz. “What it could possibly do if it remains trapped here.”

Yaz nods, and she reaches back out to Graham again, her hand taking his for the third time. “Then we will listen to you and-” she stares into the muted blue eyes of Graham, her hand squeezing his again. “-and whatever you want to do about it, you have my backing Graham.”


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And a word of warning here.  
> I do speak about what happened to Graham when they were alone, but I have tried to keep it as free of torture as possible.  
> I know it's a mature fic, but not everyone wants to read that.
> 
> If you want though. I would write the scene out and post it to my tumblr as an add on.

They don’t speak as they make their way to the kitchen. They're both focused on what they’re about to learn and reveal.

Yaz has the fear and horror that she’s going to find out what Graham exactly went through and no amount of thought can prepare her for it, because whatever she imagines she knows Graham would've gone through worst.

And Graham, anxious that he has to tell them all. That he has to relive it, but he needs to. He needs to lay it all out on the table because bottling it up and forcing it down didn’t help. That's he leant all too well.

Graham looks up, and when he sees the approach of the kitchen doors, his feet stop moving. Hesitating. Yaz turns to look back at him. "Give me a second, love, please." Yaz nods, and she comes back to stand with him. A reassuring presence, but also embarrassing. He should be looking out for her, not the other way around. Someone her age shouldn't have to take on and listen to his shit, he thinks. He nods and focuses on the door to the kitchen. "I'm ready."

They enter, the motion of the doors swishing open alerting Ryan to their sudden appearance. "What-" Ryan's surprise turns to a frown. “What are you doing here?” He asks Yaz. “I thought the Doctor-” He trails off when his eyes flick to Graham and he double-takes when he sees the state he's in. Eyes red and wet, the shake to his hands and the fear displayed across his entire body. His double-take is minor and small, but it's enough for Graham to spot. “What the hell happened?”

Yaz glances back at Graham. “Do you want me to tell Ryan, or-”

Graham shakes his head. “No, I can do it.” He says, more to convince himself than her. Graham takes in a deep breath, eyes closed while he steadies the growing anxiety. Once he thinks he has it under control, he looks to Ryan. “I- I hit a breaking point,” He turns and walks to the table, hands pulling out a chair, but his body doesn’t sit in it yet. He leans against it. Weary now.

“A breaking point?” Ryan asks, eyes darting between Graham’s back and Yaz’s face. “What do you mean? I was going to come and see you after I made you something to eat.”

Graham sags against the chair, eyes fixated onto the floor like it has the answers he needs and his hand's grip onto the wooden frame tightly. “It got too much, Ryan, and I had to leave-” He looks to his grandson. “I wasn’t planning on going anywhere in particular, but- but it said things to me, caused me to… break. I couldn't take it anymore.”

“I don’t understand-”

“Yaz, can you explain, because-” Graham trails off, eyes closing and he's trying to keep his tears from escaping as he turns his face away from Ryan. The last thing he wants him to see is this. He’s supposed to be there for him… and he can’t, can’t do it when everything inside him is in turmoil. Ryan needs him to be reliable, but how can he be that when he's falling apart?

“Yaz?” Ryan questions with concern at hearing the quiet sobs echoing from his grandad's trembling body. “What happened?”

Yaz walks over to the kettle, flicking it on and then looking to Ryan again. “I did what the Doctor told me to do.” She starts. “I went back to my room to rest, and I did at first, but I heard muffled shouting from outside my door. It stirred me awake, so I went to see what it was.”

“Shouting?” Yaz nods and silently gestures to Graham, with Ryan’s head following her movements. His frown deepens. “Grandad?” Graham stills for a moment and hums a reply at Ryan. “You were shouting. Why?”

“It’s a long story, Ryan, but the main part is that I found Graham outside my door,” Yaz answers just as the kettle clicks off, signalling that it’s finished boiling. “Sit down, and I’ll explain...”

* * *

 

The Doctor watches the screens, her eyes flicking between them before going back to the one that shows her where Graham is. There’s not much that she can actually get from it other than he’s in his room and as much as she’s worried about him; she won’t invade his privacy. To do that so soon after something intruded upon him on a personal level would be foolhardy and any trust he has in her would vanish in an instant.

And that can’t happen. Not if she is meant to help him. He was her responsibility, and she failed. She closes her eyes and brings a hand to the bridge of her nose, resting it there. This shouldn’t have happened, and Graham should have been… her brows furrow and she can feel the tension headache from the stress building. She sighs because Graham should’ve been safe, but he wasn’t, and he’s suffered something on such a personal level for nothing. Pointless and it'll affect him for the rest of his life if they don't get to the core of what is troubling him.

Her thoughts drift to the creature now, and she feels a rage grow inside her. To have something trying to take control, or in his case, succeeding in taking control. That’s enough to damage people, and she knows that Graham is strong because he’s one of the strongest people she knows. He had to be when faced with his Grace's killer, but this is different this… this is something she knows all too well.

Her mind wanders, shifting through memories. Some recent, some hundreds of years old now and she really has lived too long, she remarks, before pulling her focus back onto what she's searching for, and she finds it. On multiple occasions, she also has lost control of her body like Graham did. The living star, The Cyber-Planner, the Mara- and- Tegan, oh Tegan. _Brave heart, Tegan._ She leans down against the console and stares into it. Graham and Tegan. Both possessed against their will by something genuinely evil. In Tegan’s case, it was the Mara, in Graham’s something equally as dark from the Jeggorabax Cluster and both a direct consequence of travelling with her. Her friends lives changed forever because they took a step aboard the TARDIS.

She needs to speak to Graham, get him to open up about what happened, and the only way she can do that is if she tells him that she knows what it’s like to lose control. She looks to the screens again and frowns when his life sign is gone from his room.

The Doctor looks up and into the central column. “Where is he?” The screen flickers to a different screen, showing another corridor, and there are two life signs within it, and now they’re moving, but at a brisk walk. “Where did you lead him?”

She only gets a vwroop in response. "Fine then, be like that." The Doctor says after the TARDIS reminded her that, her current passengers are, in fact, her strays and that she is currently the only one with legs and perhaps she should go and find them. Or something, maybe she added a lot onto what was actually said. She wastes no time and marches off in the direction of the kitchen. They are her friends, the TARDIS is right about that, and she needs to speak to all of them.

* * *

Graham stares down into his tea before taking a swig of it and pulling a face at the taste. It’s not like his. Too sugary and the tea bag wasn't left in long enough, and there's too much milk.

“Oi,” Yaz says, drawing his attention to her. “I know it might not be as good as the ‘ _Best Tea Maker in Sheffield and on the TARDIS_ ', but I tried.” Her tone of voice is playful and distracting. Welcoming.

Which is relieving after what they just explained to Ryan and he's a lad who currently looks way too worried for his age. The lines on his forehead strange and alien and something that should only be on his. He flicks his eyes to Ryan. “I’m sorry for not telling you, mate.”

Ryan shakes his head and then reaches a hand out to Graham, clasping his. “Gramps,” He says, eyes wide and with a sheen to them. “You ain’t gotta say sorry for anything.” He smiles, but they all know it's forced. "I'm glad you told me now."

Graham shrugs, his head nodding slightly before he goes back to looking down into his tea again. “I know,” He murmurs just as the Doctor comes into the kitchen with a frown on her face.

“Oh, I see how it is!” The Doctor says gesturing at all of them, but her tone is hardly threatening. “Having a tea session without me?”

“I wouldn’t really call this tea-” mutters Graham, causing everyone to snap their heads to him and at his more in-character response. “What?”

“You made a sarcastic comment, gramps,” Ryan points out.

Graham leans back into his chair after placing the tea down, his eyes flicking across all of them. “I guess I did.” He focuses his gaze onto the Doctor and gestures for her to take a seat. “Sit, Doc, join us.” The Doctor doesn’t argue, and she takes the chair opposite him.

Graham looks to Yaz, who nods in encouragement and she reaches a hand out to him and holds onto his. “I said I’d be with you through this and I will, but so will they as well.” She squeezes his hand before pulling away again. "We're all here for you."

“I- I know.”

“Through this?” Ryan asks, eyes darting between them. “What do you mean?”

Graham closes his eyes and inhales slowly, holding it and then releasing it before opening his eyes and looking into theirs. “I’m- I’m going to tell you what it did to me.”

The Doctor widens her eyes, and she looks to Yaz, seeing the lack of surprise and then she turns to Ryan whose eyes are just as shocked. It seems Ryan also didn’t know what was going to happen.

“And I just want you to listen. I don’t want you to talk, because this will be hard enough as it is.” He says, laying out his rules. Ryan and Yaz nod and he returns their gesture. Satisfied that they won't talk, he now looks towards the Doctor. “That means you as well, Doc, cause we all know how you like talking and all.”

The Doctor nods. “If that is what you wish, Graham, then I will comply.”

Graham removes his eyes from them and stares back into the cup again. It’s easier to look at. The liquid moving about, dark and opaque. Like a deep lake, hiding her secrets. He takes in a deep and breath and begins.

He tells of everything. From the beginning to the end, to when he first realised it could hurt him by the breaking of his rib, then from the taunting to the goading. The threats, the constant manipulations, and that’s just the start. He’s not even reached the worst yet, and he already hears the barely concealed sobs from Yaz. He sees Ryan’s hands clenched tight, and he feels his leg shaking next to his… and what he sees from the Doctor is a stillness. Quiet and unnatural for the woman who is always on the move. Never one to sit still and yet here she is intently listening and showing no emotion.

He pauses his story, throat sore from how much he’s spoken. Probably more than he’s said in the week just gone by and he still has more to tell, and this will be the worst. Graham breathes out and starts from the time it wrapped his hands around Yaz’s neck on the upstairs landing, and then the fall from the bannister where he broke his arm. He comments on how the Doctor is never to kick him in the bollocks again, and that she owes him something for that. Perhaps that's humour or something, but maybe it's stalling because _it's_ coming and he doesn't want to talk about it.

And yet he still hesitates again, hand drumming against the table. He never wanted to think about the _torture_ again, the word catching in his mind and his tears free-fall with panic, fear, and anxiety as he explains how it broke a mirror, smashed his fist through it and then gripped his hand around a shard. He doesn’t need to explain what it did with it. His scars are proof of that. They’ve all saw them. They all know how deep it cut into him.

But what he hasn’t ever mentioned is the next bit. The part that after it got bored of cutting and marking him for life. It turned it’s cruelty inside and brought back the worst experience in his life, not literally, but the weakness, the sickness, the part where you think that you’re going to die- and he left him there, hanging on for what felt like an eternity before yanking him back and repeating the process. The pressure being applied against his internal organs left him screaming, his throat becoming raw before it all stopped suddenly, and he felt the rage from it when they broke into its inner sanctum, when it used his fists to rip the door apart, the wood fragments digging it and mixing with his slick blood.

And he stops for a moment. Swallowing dryly before continuing as he explains how he was forced to watch as it attacked his family, forced to watch as it threw Yaz into the wall and latched its hands around Ryan and then as quick as that happened he soon felt blissful nothing until he woke within Resus One.

Scarred, terrified, and so very alone for the first time since it happened. With only the sound of a heart rate monitor beeping away.

There’s silence amongst them all, with not one of them speaking at all now. Just the sounds of Yaz’s sobs, and Ryan’s heavy breathing; he looks up again and into the Doctor’s eyes. There’s thunder behind them, and her knuckles are white from the pressure of her fingers digging into her palms.

"Graham," The Doctor says, her voice filled with ice and barely contained anger. "I understand what it's like." Graham frowns at her, but he doesn't say anything. "I've had things in my mind before..., and I understand, and I'm sorry because no one should go through that." She finally looks up and into his eyes. "I'm so, so sorry."

Graham stares back his gaze unmoving. "Then you'd understand why I want it dead, Doc."

Yaz nods and grabs his hand again. “I said you’d have my backing- and- and you do, Graham.” She says over her tears. "Whatever you decide, I stand with you."

Ryan reaches out as well, his hand resting against Graham’s shoulder. He doesn’t speak, not that Graham expected him to. He’s stoic, and unfortunately, he’s had the practice of concealing what he’s feeling. The lad came so close to losing someone else he cares and loves, and Graham can't have that. Can't abandon the boy to his father. He gives him a nod, knowing that he stands with him as well.

The Doctor is the last to reach out, and she takes ahold of his hand. “Very well, Graham.” She nods. “We’ll destroy it.”

Graham sucks in a shaky breath, and he looks to them all before locking his eyes back on the Doctor again. “But I want to be the one to do it.”

The Doctor frowns at him. “Graham, I’m not sure that's-”

“No,” He interrupts. “I need to see it die. I need to tell it that I won't let it control my life again. I want to see it dead and gone so it can never hurt anyone ever again.” He says as he stares into her soul. Tired blue eyes locked against her ancient brown ones. “I need to be the one to do it and for that, Doctor, I'll need your help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're near the end! Just the next chapter to go and then the epilogue.
> 
> And I can't believe I've got this far with it. I'd love to hear feedback! :)


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter and the epilogue.
> 
> Oh, boy.
> 
> Right TW: Graham mentions that he wants it all to end in this, I don't actively say it, but I hint to it and he eludes to wanting to die or at least to not have to live with it anymore.
> 
> But it ends hopeful for him.

“Where are you taking me?” Graham asks as he looks around the corridors, not recognising anything that looks familiar. If he had to guess they would be somewhere off the beaten track, the dust floating through the air confirms it as well.

“Attic.”

“Attic?”

“Yup.”

Graham frowns at her back, but he doesn’t ask her to elaborate. He’s tired and emotionally drained, and quite honestly, he can’t be bothered anymore. The wonder of it all has faded. It doesn't matter anymore.

The Doctor slows her steps and starts to walk in tandem with Graham when she spots him trailing behind her, she turns and glances at him. “Be honest with me here, Graham, how are you doing-”

“Doc, I’ve been honest with you all today, why do I have to do it now?” Graham interjects, snappily and he doesn’t mean it, not really. He sighs. “I’m sorry for snapping.”

“I know, Graham, and you don’t have to say sorry.” She smiles at him, but he doesn’t return it. His face is blank, empty. “You know, I’m so, so proud of you, you’re brave for telling us what happened,” The Doctor says, patient and encouraging and-

_"I'm not a child."_

Her expression softens, and she sighs. “I need to know what you’re feeling. That’s all, Graham.”

“Do you really need to ask?” Graham mutters and goes back to looking at the interior walls of the TARDIS. He breathes in the stale air. “I feel-” What does he feel? He doesn’t know, not really anymore. He goes back to looking around again the orange glow is still there, but it bleeds into a mix of different textures and colours. There are circles on the wall at one point, coral type patterns the next, white dotting through it all, and cold steel poking through before repeating.

“You’re looking at the walls.” The Doctor points out. “Why?”

“They look different,” Graham answers and he gestures to them. “I would’ve thought that your ship looked the same throughout, but these are all different.”

The Doctor follows his gaze and notices them for the first time. “We’re deep within her,” She starts to explain. “And I’ve had many designs. This far into her, somewhere where only I go-” the Doctor says with a detached voice, distant but here at the same time. “She doesn’t feel the need to make everything look the same, so she lets my old console rooms bleed together in remembrance.”

That doesn’t make sense, not really, but he doesn’t really care. Maybe before he would’ve, maybe in a few months, he will, but now, he doesn’t, and he can’t bring himself to. _“Remembrance.”_

The Doctor stops and stares at Graham. “What do you mean?”

Graham shrugs. “I’ve done enough remembering for a lifetime, Doc, I’m tired of it all.” He looks ahead. “When do I get a _break_?” He looks to her now. “No matter where I go, the universe makes me remember. My house is Grace, all of it is her so I ran from it and it was good, so good until we hit Norway, and everything came back again.” He stops and runs has hands down his face. “Then her murderer came back… and the wound in my heart was opened again,” He removes his hands from his face and stares ahead. “I’ve had _enough_.”

The Doctor reaches out a hand to him. He doesn’t pull away, just allows her to take it. “Graham,” The Doctor says, but he doesn’t turn to look at her. “Please, Graham, look at me.” He shakes his head, and she sees the small tremble to his body, the wetness to his eyes and she takes in a deep breath. “Oh, Graham.” She reaches forward and pulls him into a hug, one he doesn’t fight, but he clings to her, and the mask slips again. He’s a broken man and one who needs help. “We don’t have to do this if it’s too much-”

“I’m sorry,” Graham mumbles, forever apologising. “For everything.”

She doesn’t correct him, she knows the futility of it at the moment. It's his guilt making him say it, and that's something she can't fix. “Graham, I’m asking your permission here, and I wouldn’t do it without your consent.”

“What?”

“Let me-” She pulls away from him and looks into his face. “Remember what I did, back in the house? When I looked into its mind?” Graham stiffens, body tensed, but he nods. “Let me see yours; I won’t dig-”

“No,”

“Graham-”

“ _No_!” Graham snaps, pulling himself away from her. “Please, I- I’ve had enough things digging around in here-” He jabs a finger at his head, the motion aggressive and harsh. “I don’t want more- I just-” He’s breathing hard. “I just want it to end- I want to end; I- I can’t do it anymore- I just want it dead, and I want not to feel this... whatever it is anymore.” His tears fall as he stares at her, chest moving with laboured breaths. “I’m broken, and I’m tired, I'm so very tired of _everything_.”

Her hearts still, and there’s a growing flash of panic rising in her. “Are you saying that you want-”

“ _No_ ,” Graham bites out, brows screwed together as he collapses against the wall, hands digging into his head. “No- I don’t know, Doctor, I’m- I told you what it did to me and what I did to myself after, what I pictured. I don’t want to feel anything _anymore_.” He looks down, chest rising and falling, but his eyes lock onto his arms. “Every time I see myself, I am reminded.”

The Doctor watches as Graham rips his jacket off and that’s something she never expected him to do. His eyes are locked onto the scars on his arms. They run up from the inside of his hands, both used to hold onto the shard then up to his arms, and towards what she knows is on his torso which is thankfully hidden under a t-shirt, but each mark stands out. From the ones poking out of the collar of his t-shirt to the ones on his arms and hands.

“Fixing me is like fixing these, you can’t-” He gestures his arms out to her. “-They’re there permanently.”

“They might be, Graham, but those are scars, your mental health is diff-”

“Scars don’t heal, Doctor,” Graham interjects, voice lacking any emotion. “I don’t want to talk about this… I just want to destroy that creature, that’s it, that’s all I want because nothing else about me matters anymore. I don’t care.” He flicks his eyes to the ground. “I care about you three just enough to not end it.” And with that, he turns away from her.

And she watches him, the jacket held in his hands before being thrown to the ground. He's lost, broken, and so very fragile. Leaving him by himself would risk everything, but she’s not the sort of Doctor he needs. If she was, she could possibly help him, but she isn’t and what Graham needs is psychological help, but not something that Earth can give him.

How long until they lock him in a psychiatric hospital? A day? An hour? His troubles, what he’s been through sounds insane on paper, but it’s not. It happened, and Mabli was right. He needs time to heal, and he needs to do it in a place that believes in him.

And that won’t be Earth.

“Come on, Graham, let’s get this over with.”

* * *

 

“Do you think they’ve done it?” Ryan asks in a whisper, his hands folded across his chest anxiously.

“I don’t know, Ryan,” Yaz answers back, equally distressed.

“I should’ve gone with them,” Ryan says. “He’s my grandad and- and he’s been through so much… he’s- he’s-” And Ryan breaks, his usual steady composure gone and replaced with sobs wracking his body. “I don’t know what to do.”

Yaz wipes a hand across her own eyes and turns to look down the corridor that the Doctor and Graham walked down. They both were ordered to stay behind. Not by the Doctor, but by Graham and neither were going to fight him on that. Or make him try to let them through.

But it doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt seeing him like that. Yaz thinks back to the times he helped her or offered advice. _‘I honestly don’t know whether any of us know the real truth of our own lives. Cause we’re too busy living them from the inside.’_ flashes through her head, but that man is gone, and she misses him.

“We have to be there for him, Ryan, like he’s been there for us.”

“And what if that isn’t enough, Yaz?”

She looks down the corridor, and the lump grows in her throat. “Then we pick up the pieces,” She swallows. “Every time, like he'd do for us.

* * *

She’s lead him further on into the TARDIS, his bare feet padding across the floor, but it isn’t cold. It’s warm, and perhaps that is the ships doing. He dropped his jacket along the way, the Doctor flicking her eyes to it, but he doesn’t want it anymore.

There’s nothing he wants.

Because what’s the point in it all?

“We’re here.”

Graham doesn’t speak. He just waits for her to open the door and as soon as she does, he steps in. His eyes darting around and latching onto the objects dotted around. Each one small and unassuming, but if she locked it in here then they aren’t, but none of that is essential.

He searches for it and stops when he sees it placed on the head of a mannequin. At least it isn’t on a skull this time. “It’s dull,” Graham says, noting the faded colour of the jewel. “Why?”

“I’ve locked it away, Graham,” The Doctor answers. “It’s imprisoned in there, surrounded by a wall of unbreakable concrete.”

“Alive though.”

“Yes.”

Graham walks forward, and he rises a hand upwards. “It can’t get out?”

“No, Graham, nothing it does will allow it to escape.”

He reaches forward, hand hesitating in the air for a split second before he latches his hand around it and takes it off the head. It’s neither cold, nor does he feel the power shoot through him like he did before. In his hands is a simple tiara. Pretty.

On the outside, though.

On the inside, Graham knows the monster that lies within. Such a little thing cause so much hurt over the years. So much death and hate over the years.

“If the people who lived in that house… if that Lady only listened to it; then none of this would’ve happened.” He murmurs, not really intending for the Doctor to hear. “God knows how many are dead because people were incapable of _listening_ -” He spits out with anger. “They tortured it, but that doesn’t excuse what it did.”

The Doctor comes forward and stands next to Graham. “No, it doesn’t.”

“We all have choices to make, Doc, and I could be like it; if I wanted, cause I was tortured… and it once said that-” His voice trails away as he stares down at it.

“What did it say, Graham?”

“That I could become like it if I were subjugated to torture,” Graham reveals as he looks up to the Doctor. “But I haven’t, have I?” He pauses. “Will I? It’s a mess in here-”

“No, you haven’t… not in a long shot.” The Doctor reaffirms for him. “You felt guilty and that’s human, Graham, that shows you aren't like it.”

“It wanted to keep me alive, wanted us to become a team,” Graham says, cocking his head to the side. “After it killed you all, it was going to make me like him; I would’ve been the same, a monster.”

“Graham, you aren’t the same.” The Doctor speaks, walking forward now and resting her hands on his. Gentle fingers removing the tiara from him, but keeping it close. “Listen to me; you are not the same; you’re nothing alike. What it did to you was evil and cruel, and for you to be stood here, wanting to face it again shows how strong you are, Graham,” He turns his head away from her. “You will overcome this.”

“Will it get magically better though?” Graham demands. “Stand there, Doc, and tell me that it’ll get better that I won’t feel broken and- and damaged. Tell me, please, cause if you know- If you could possibly know that this- that this won’t hurt, that I won’t feel shame and guilt every time I look at Yaz or Ryan or you,” He turns away from her and goes to lean on a nearby shelf. “I had my hands around her throat… I felt them- Everything it did to me was personal and bespoke. It knew everything; it wasn’t just matter of it hurting me, it dug into my mind and tormented me with words, Doctor, it made everything I did into a game.”

“You never said it went through your mind-”

“It didn’t go through my mind, Doctor, it tore for it- Every fleeting thought I had, it laid it bare. It knew what we did to Tzim-Sha, called me a monster for locking him away-” Graham turns back again and jabs a hand towards the tiara in her hands. “Like you did to it and you stood there and called me the better man for it!” He shouts, anger coming forward. “How am I the better man when I did what you did to it… it’s fear about being trapped. I made another living creature suffer through that when killing it would’ve been kinder.”

“Killing is never-”

“So why are you letting me do it now?” Graham throws at her. “I’m terrified of it, but I hate it at the same time, so why? What is different this time?”

“I let you down!” The Doctor yells back, hands dropping the tiara on the floor. “I let you down, Graham.”

Graham stills, heart, beating rapidly in his chest and breathing coming fast. “ _What_?”

“ _I let you down_.” She repeats, softer, and she walks forward. “I should be the one apologising to you.” She looks into his eyes. “I never wanted you to become that man, and I thought by laying down a hard rule, you’ll think twice about your course of action back on that planet.” She reaches out and takes his hand. “But it wasn’t me who convinced you; it was Ryan, it’s why I paired you two together.”

“But we still locked-”

“Graham, you are not a monster.” The Doctor says. “I failed to protect you, and for that, I am _sorry_.” Graham looks down, eyes flicking to his arms and then to the tiara. “There’s a difference between taking a life and not Graham, and you haven’t,” She pauses and wonders how he’ll take this. “But I have, and I know the mark it leaves on your soul. I never wanted that for you.”

Graham raises his head and looks to her. “You- _you what?_ ”

“I’m old Graham, and I’ve fought in wars-” She looks away. “I said I learnt to think like a Dalek long ago, remember? It was true. I’ve done things… but I try to be the best I can be, and that involves not killing. I didn’t want that for you because you’re a good man, Graham, you don’t deserve that, like you didn’t deserve this.”

“But I’m going to kill it now-”

“No, you’re not, it’s your decision, but you won’t be the one to do it, I will.”

Graham shakes his head. “I can’t let you do that Doctor; you just said you try to be the best you can… and I can’t ask you to do that for me.”

“You're better than me, Graham, please let me do this for you.”

Graham considers it, gaze switching between his friend and the tiara and seconds turn to minutes while he processes it all before he nods, accepting the Doctor’s offer. “Okay, fine, you can do it and... I’m ready.”

She nods and pulls herself away, and he watches as she bends, hands picking the tiara up in one smooth motion and placing it upon her head. The Doctor’s face twists, but after a moment she opens her eyes and holds her hands out to Graham, gesturing them. He swallows nervously and steps forward, his shaking hands rising and heading towards her own hands. They clasp them together, and at first, he feels nothing, just nothing, but he's used to that… and then he... he feels affection and care and love and hope.

Friendship. Forgiveness. Faith.

And Graham knows this is what the Doctor is feeling. Can feel the touch of her mind on his and she’s leaving him with the choice to allow her to enter his. To meld their minds together with the tiara and he feels fear… to be connected to it again… but the Doctor is here, and she’s formidable, and she'll protect him.

So he allows her entry into his mind. Eyes closing and then opening, but not… it’s strange and dark, and he knows he’s not technically looking at it with his eyes, but he is, and he’s floating... and for the first time in a while, he feels peace. His own? Probably not.

“We’re connected, Graham.” The Doctor voice cuts into his silence. “We’re not in each other minds, not really, but we’re sharing space through the tiara.”

He looks to where it’s coming from, and he spots the Doctor looking at a grey box. The size of a cell but with no windows and he goes closer. “Is it in there?”

The Doctor nods and glances to her right when Graham appears next to her. “He doesn’t know we’re here.” She states. “I can destroy it now-”

“No,” Graham says, and he steps forward. “I want to talk to it.”

“I don’t know if that’s-”

“Please, Doctor, please let me.”

The Doctor nods and Graham turns back around again, his eyes locked on the grey wall and then widening slightly when a door appears. “Go ahead, Graham.”

Graham inhales and steps forward, hands forming fists before his steps towards the door. All the pain. Everything that caused this is behind that door, and he’s about to have a conversation with it like an old friend in a coffee shop. He exhales and reaches forward, hand connecting to the doorknob and pushing it open and entering.

* * *

 

“They’ve been gone a while,” Yaz points out, now sitting against the floor and wall. “How long do you think they will be?”

Ryan shrugs. “I dunno,” He looks down the corridor again. “I hope they'll be back soon.”

“I’m sure they will be, but-” Yaz starts, but she trails away.

“But?”

Yaz sighs and rests her head against the back wall, her eyes flicking down to Ryan sitting opposite her and she can’t help but be reminded of how she found Graham a few hours earlier. “This is how I found him, by the way.”

Ryan frowns for a second and then he nods, understanding what she means. “He hid it, everything.”

“He did,” She replies, and there is a silence between them. Pained and uncomfortable. “I wish he told us instead of letting it build.”

“It was bad?”

Yaz nods. “I’ve seen panic attacks; on the job, at school,” She looks down the corridor. “I never expected to see Graham go through one.”

“I have,” Ryan says quietly while Yaz snaps her head to him. “He never knew I did, though.”

“What do you mean?”

Ryan sucks in a breath and rests his arms on his knees, hands moving together with nerves. “It was just after he got the all-clear, well, a few months later when he moved in.” Ryan looks up, eyes misty. “Oh, you should’ve seen him Yaz, because he didn’t look the way he does now- all skin and bones, no hair-”

“That’s hard to imagine-”

“He went through chemo, Yaz,” Ryan points out. “He hardly ate, and it took months for him to gain weight, and I think that's half the reason he eats now because he couldn't before-” He sighs. “It happened one night, they both thought I was asleep upstairs, but I heard them, heard my nan talking to him, and so I came downstairs to look, and I saw him seized up on the sofa, hands gripping into it, and his eyes squeezed shut.”

“Oh, Graham,” Yaz says, voiced breaking with a sob. "He never seemed like the type."

“He thought the cancer was back, Yaz, that’s all he was muttering, but my nan, she said it wasn’t, and she sang to him. I might’ve not got along with him, but I never faulted him about that or brought it up. He still doesn’t know I saw him have it.”

“He’s been through a lot.”

Ryan nods and lowers his eyes to the ground again. “He has.”

"We'll be there for him, Ryan, whatever he decides."

* * *

“Graham?” The creature says, turning to face him. “Wait, what is this? Why are you here?”

“To talk, and to end you,” Graham says to him, nerves increasing in its presence.

“End?” He repeats, brows creasing in thought and Graham hates that it still uses his face. “No, you have to sound more convincing than that, my friend.”

“I’m not your friend.”

“Lover, perhaps? We had a connection, and you're body is one of the nicer ones I had.” The creature suggests and laughs, low and long. “Oh, no, we’re not friends, we could’ve been if you just let me finish what I started.”

“By murdering my friends?” Graham snaps at him, anger breaking through.

“Ooh, temper, temper.” He says, smugly. “Why are you here, anyway?” He cocks his head to the side and gets up. “Did you find your way here or is she around? The Time Lord, oh, she can’t be far away can she because she wouldn’t let her friend... pet, maybe, be alone in here with me.”

“You can’t control me now,” Graham says, taking a deep breath and stepping forward. “We’re the same in here. Equal.”

“Are we?” The creature repeats and reaches out to Graham, his hands pressing against Graham’s chest, but moving no further. There’s a frustrated look on his face that causes Graham to take note as he steps back, free.

“I said you couldn’t control me in here, I’m free, but you’re not, you're stuck.”

The creature sneers at Graham, bravado gone and replaced by anger. “I could’ve made you strong, but your ties to them made you weak-”

“No, my ties to them made me strong, I broke past your control when you harmed them-”

“After I threw the girl into a wall, you mean?” The creature throws back. “You weren’t strong when I was cutting into your flesh; you cried and screamed.”

“I’m not important, but they are, and you hurt them,” Graham says, trying to be strong and not full victim to it's taunting. “What you did, that’s unforgivable.”

“You blame yourself for what I did, Graham.” The creature says, sitting back down on the floor. “Which is a ridiculous notion.”

Graham looks down at the creature that wears his face. “Do you want to die?” The creature looks up at Graham. “You suffered.”

“Like I made you suffer?” Graham flinches at the remarks, hands moving and rubbing at his arms. “What I did to you is what they did to me.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why’d you do it, truthfully. You got your revenge against the Lady of the house, but why the rest? Why us?”

The creature furrows his brows and looks up at Graham. “Did she ever explain what we are? The things that live in the Jeggorabax cluster?” Graham shakes his head. “We’re not like you, and we envy that. Your emotions sustain us, from fear to anger to even love; it’s powerful and fulfilling.”

“And what has that got to do with what you did?”

“They cut that from me; my entire purpose was torn and thrown aside, the rock, my flesh, used as a foundation in the house and my light crafted into a tiara.” He rests his head on the concrete. “They ignored me when I manifested myself to them when I pleaded with them to stop what they were doing- they refused to listen, they just cut more and more of me away, until nothing was left, just rage and pain- everything I took from them. All their negative emotions until that was all I felt. All that I was made from.”

“You said you could’ve helped them, healed them.”

“They weren’t interested in my healing, said they knew how to heal already- all they wanted was what I could offer them in power, which was nothing. Even after I explained that it wouldn’t work, and then she saw the light of me, and demanded to have it.”

“So you killed her.”

“And her family and I would’ve stopped but the power- oh, the power made me feel again. Strong, and so I did it again and again until it was all I knew.”

Graham cocks his head to the side. “Your tragic backstory doesn’t excuse what you did.”

“Does it excuse it for her as well? The Time Lord out there.” He asks with a nod of his head. “She’s done things, I see it in her eyes. Does her tragic backstory excuse that?”

“I don’t know what she did.”

“And do you not want to find out?”

Graham flicks his eyes to the door and then shakes his head. “I have my own shit to deal with, and she has hers.” He looks back to the creature again. “Would death bring you peace?”

The creature looks up at Graham, clicking on to where he is going with this. “Have you really come to end me?” He stares straight at Graham. “Give me the peace of death, unlike the creature that killed your wife.”

“I wouldn’t be doing this for you, and perhaps I should reword that questions, would killing you bring me peace?”

The creature's face turns from a sneer and into a speculative one. “No,” He answers, truthfully for once and without twisting it. “What I did to you has left it marks on your body and soul and killing me won’t free you from that.”

“I thought that as well.” Graham agrees. “And for that, I should leave you here forever, long after I’m gone. You’d be stuck here, within these walls in torture.”

“And you’d be within your right to do that, Graham.”

“But I won’t.”

The creature raises an eyebrow at him. “Why? What happened to _being the better man?_ ”

“I’m not killing you in revenge, not like I wanted to do to Tzim-Sha, revenge would mean I care, and I don’t.” Graham states.

“So why are you signing my death warrant then?” He wonders. “If you don’t care.”

“Because it’s safer, no matter how much they say that you’re locked away in here, that you can’t escape, there’s the chance that you’d find a way and I won’t be responsible for that.” He steps closer to him. “I won’t have their blood on my hands, no more than I already do anyway.” Graham turns and walks away.

“She’s right, you know,” The creature speaks. “You’re nothing like me.”

“I know.”

"Thank you, Graham," The creature says. "Truthfully."

And with that, he exits and gives the okay to the Doctor. He doesn’t speak; he watches as the room crumbles away, a faint green light disappearing like dust in the air. Dispersing.

He just wishes he felt something for it. Anything would do, but all he feels is a comfortable numbness.

* * *

 

They walk back in silence, the Doctor shooting Graham’s glances and watching as he holds onto the tiara. It’s lifeless, just a husk, is what she told him, but he hasn’t said anything, and she doesn’t know what they spoke about in the cell.

That was between them and to intrude on it would be a betrayal of trust. She just did what Graham asked her to do, and she could’ve made it painful, but she didn’t. Like going to sleep. More than it deserved.

She turns to face forward again, and her mind goes over all that they spoke about. Indeed, she can’t help him, neither can Ryan or Yaz, and to let them try would be unfair because what Graham needs is bespoke care and attention.

Someone that will never question or lose patience, someone trained to deal with the after-effects of torture and control. Abuse and manipulative partners because it was. The creature dug into his flaws, brought them to the surface and laid them out like cards upon a table for Graham to see.

But Earth can’t offer than to him. They could help, but his explanation would get him locked away, and that’s the last thing he needs. He needs freedom to an extent.

And there’s only one place she can think of that could offer the help that he needs, but she’s not sure he’ll go for it. He’ll have to step away from them all because they can’t stay there with them.

“Graham,” The Doctor says, her tone of voice causing him to pause and look to her. “I want to ask you something.”

“What?”

“You need help-”

“That’s not asking something, that’s stating the obvious, captain,” Graham says.

The Doctor smiles at him. She’ll deal with sarcasm, even if it’s at his own expense. It’s something. “I know somewhere that could offer that to you.”

“On Earth?” He asks, and she shakes her head. “Then, where?”

“It’s a place called Kellar, situated on the belt of Tulara. A beautiful nebula and one you can see from the surface, as the moon is bathed in the light from the nearest blue giant.” She explains. “It coats everything in a blue, while the Nebula shines in bright red and coats the rest in-”

“What does that have to do with getting me help?” Graham interrupts. “No offence.”

“None took, but it does have something to do with it,” The Doctor says. “The moon belongs to the people of Edut, but most people call them the Kellarians because Kellar is what they are known for. That and their gift for empathy.”

Graham frowns at her and takes a moment to think about it. “What are you saying, Doctor?”

“I can take you there and they can help you.”

“Like therapy?”

The Doctor shakes her head, and this is the part that she’s not sure he’ll go for. “Yes and no.” She steps towards him. “It’s therapy, but you have to stay there.”

“So a hospital then, one where they lock me in a room and feed me pills because I’m-”

“No, Graham, no, nothing like that,” She interjects, quickly and efficiently. “Their empathy, their gifts make it nothing of the sort.”

“What do you mean?”

“They can feel what you feel, they feel the pain you’ve been through, and they understand,” The Doctor explains. “They never judge you, and they won’t pity you, but they will listen and help to the best of their abilities.”

“But I have to stay there.”

The Doctor nods. “Going to and from won’t help you, Graham, but staying there until you’re ready-”

“But what if I’m never ready, Doctor, what then? Do I stay there, never to see Earth again? Or Ryan? Yaz? You?” Graham says. “Because I might never be ready.”

“Then you’re my responsibility, and if you want to leave, they’ll allow you to, and I’ll stay with you. I won’t abandon you, Graham.”

Graham looks away from her and considers it. “Why can’t you stay there with me?”

“Because it’s a safe place for people who have been hurt in different ways, all are there for reasons known only to them and their therapist.”

“But I’ll be alone,” Graham mumbles.

“It’s your decision, Graham, no one will force you to do anything, and you can always come back if you hate it.”

Graham stares down, eyes flicking to his bare arms and the memory that he dropped his jacket someone in the ship hits him. He liked that jacket, but that thought is fleeting when he ponders the Doctor’s option. “You say I can come back whenever I want?” The Doctor nods, and he pauses again before looking her in the eye. “Alright then, take me there.”

The Doctor gives him another nod. “Thank you for trying.” He only gives her the briefest of smiles back, but it’s something.

And she’ll take it.

  
**EPILOGUE**

_Nine months later…_

And Graham finds himself looking around his room for them months with fondness; he's packing it all up now because he's ready. The light source they placed in his room for humans is gone now. Something about the natural light. From the star not being enough for them, and their sun being too much for the Kellarians, so the humans had to have it in their rooms. He never attempted to understand the reason behind, not in the beginning anyway.

And by the time he could be bothered to figure it out, it would’ve been too embarrassing to ask, but even then Iq'ix, his therapist. A strange bug-like creature that would be terrifying if it wasn’t for the calming pheromones, or the fact that once he got to know her, he soon realised that she was simply a big bee, fluffy and friendly, if not very _smug_. She found amusement in that. He also learnt that the empathy was more to do with a hivemind than anything else, something that when you're there for long enough, even if you're just a human as Iq'ix said, you pick up on.

And perhaps that's a gift now, something he gained by being here. Being able to pick up on subtle shifts in conversations, to just a general feel of what everyone is experiencing around you and then finally, you see it. The beauty in the air, the nebula is lighting the moon in red while the sun counters in blue.

A wonderful contrast and a real example of what people who come here feel. Each side is fighting for control. The red represents the fire of the soul, the injustice and anger at what each person here feels. The blue- like a sea, calm at points and swirling the next until both come together in a crash of soothing purple.

And it took him a while to see it, but when he did. He did. Iq'ix encouraged him to paint it, and he scoffed at her at first. Painting, he sucked at it in school, what hope did he have now at fifty-nine? Turns out quite a lot actually.

Graham looks at the piece he painted with nerves. Iq'ix asked what the box in his mind meant to him, not like he needed to explain for her really, but he did. Family, friendship, the main themes. Love and hope in dark times, another. Exploration and running away. Travelling and helping.

And then he painted it, and it took him ages, but he got it down. The box slotted between the red and blue, surrounded by the purple, but that’s not the main part to it. It’s the people inside, looking out through the doors while the orange flows from within.

They are the ones that matter, and when he showed it to Iq'ix, she said it was nice, but where was he? If all those things he mentioned meant so much to the box and the people, then where was he within it all? Surely they would want him there as well.

And so he painted himself for the first time. An insight into his soul and this took him longer than anything else. He wasn’t going to paint onto the canvas of the painted TARDIS, tainting it with something he struggles with accepting, so he painted on whatever came to him. Self-portraits, each one turning out like that creature until they didn’t… and he learnt to accept himself again finally… when he realised why each one looked wrong. It was his scars. He never painted them, and when he did for the first time, it slotted into place. He finally accepted that he is who he is, scars and all and that the creature, the long-dead creature, truthfully has no more control on him.

Iq'ix looked at him smugly when he told her this and damn her, he was played like a fiddle, but he laughed and smiled and cried and felt relief.

He’ll struggle, and he’ll have ups and downs. Mental health doesn’t just vanish like a bruise; it’s a scar. It stays, but it doesn’t have to be huge and daunting. It can be small and faded, and hardly worth thinking about most days.

It took a while, but he got there in the end, with the help of a giant smug Bee, the hope of his friends and family, and the willpower to see the world and his life in a new light. Together, whole.

And determined to put what happened in the past.

To move on and love life again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it!
> 
> Thank you to everyone who read, and if you could, please leave a comment saying what you liked about it! Because this was the first story I've ever written in full, and I'd like to know what everyone liked about it!
> 
> Thank you all for reading, and if you want more angst I currently have a story called 'you made me a murderer' going on with Dark!Doctor.


End file.
